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LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 



AUTHOR OF < THE CAMP OF REFUGE.' 








LONDON: 
CHARLES KNIGHT & Co., LUDGATE STREET. 



1845. 



12 7 

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LEGEND OF READING ABBEY; 



I. 



It was in the year of Grace eleven hundred and 
thirty-seven (when the grace of God appeared to 
be entirely departing from the sinful and unhappy 
land of England), and Stephen of Blois, nephew of 
the deceased King Henry Beauclere, sat upon the 
throne, lawfully and honestly, as some men said, 
but most unlawfully, according to others. And 
the woe I have to relate arose from this divey 
gency of opinion, but still more from the changd 
ableness of men's minds, which led our bishops 
lords, and optimates to side now with one part} 
and now with the other, and now change sides 
again, to the great perplexing of the understanding 
of honest and simple men, to the undoing of their 
fortunes, and well nigh to the utter ruin of this 
realm, which that learned clerk and right politic 
King Henricus Primus had left in so flourishing 
and peaceful a condition. 

Our great religious house of Reading (may the 
hand of sacrilege and the flames of war never more 
reach it !), founded and endowed by the Beauclere, 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

ad then been newly raised on that smiling, favoured 
pot of earth which lies on the bank of the Kennet, 
lard by the juncture of that clear and swift stream 
.vith our glorious river Thamesis ; and in sooth 
our noble house was not wholly finished and fur- 
nished at this time ; for albeit the first church, 
together with most of its chapels and shrines, was 
in a manner completed, and our great hall was 
roofed in, and floored and lined with oak, the lord 
abbat's apartment^ and the lodging of the prior, 
and the dormitory for the brethren, and the gra- 
nary and the stables for my lord abbat's horses, 
were yet unfinished ; and, except on Sundays and 
the feast days of Mother Church, these parts of the 
abbey were filled by artisans and well-skilled work- 
men who had been collected from Windsor, Wal- 
lingford, Oxenford, Newbury, nay even from the 
right royal city of Winchester, which abounded 
with well -skilled masons and builders, and the 
capital city of London, where all the arts be most 
cultivated. Moreover, sundry artists we had from 
yond the seas, as masons and hewers of stone, 
ho had been sent unto us from Caen in Normandie 
>y the defunct king, and some right skilful carvers 
n wood and in stone, who had been brought out 
of Italie by Father Michael Angelo Torpietro, a 
member of our house, who had quitted the glorious 
monastery of Mons Casinium, which had been 
raised and occupied by the founder of our order, 
the blessed Benedict himself, when he was in the 
flesh, in order to live among us and instruct us in 
humane letters and in all the rules and ordinances 
of our order, wherein we Anglo and Anglo-Nor- 
man monks, in verity, needed some instruction. 
And this Father Torpietro of happy memory had 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 7 

also been enabled by the liberality of our first lord 
abbat to bring from the city of Pisa in Italie a 
right good limner, who painted such saints and 
Virgins upon gilded panels as had not before been 
seen in England, and who was now painting the 
chapel of our Ladie with rare and inappreciable 
art, as men who have eyes and understanding may 
see at this day. All the learned and periti do 
affirm that for limning and gilding our chapel of 
the Ladie doth excel whatever is seen in the 
churches of Westminster and Winchester in the 
south, or in the churches of York and Durham in 
the north, or in the churches of Wells and Exeter 
in the west, or in Ely and Lincoln in the east. [I 
speak not of the miracles performed by our relics : 
they are known to the world, and be at least as great 
as those performed by our Ladie of Walsingham.] 
Albeit our walls of stone and flint were not all 
finished in the inner part, our house was girded 
and guarded by ramparts of royal charters and 
papal bulls. Two charters had we from our 
founder, and one from King Stephen, confirmatory 
of those two. And great were the immunities and 
privileges contained in these charters. No scutage 
had we to pay ; no stallage, no tolls, no tribute ; no 
customs in fair or market, no tithing penny or 
two-penny, no amercements or fines or forfeitures 
of any kind ! Our mills were free, and our fisheries 
and our woods and parks. No officer of the king 
was to exercise any right in the woods and chases of 
the lord abbat, albeit they were within the limits of 
the forests royal ; but the lord abbat and the monks 
and their servitors were to hold and for ever enjoy the 
same powers and liberties in their woods and chases 
as the king had in his. Hence was the House of 

b2 



8 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Reading ever well stocked with the succulent meat 
of the buck. Too long were it to tell all that our 
founder Henricus did for us. At the beginning of 
his reign, he abolished the ancient power of abbats 
to make knights ; yet, in order to distinguish our 
house, he did, by a particular clause in our charter 
of foundation, give unto the lord abbat of Reading 
and to his successors for ever, authority to make 
knights, whether clerks or laymen, provided only 
that the ceremony should be performed by the 
abbat in his clerical habit and capacity, and not 
as a layman, and that he should be careful to ad- 
vance none but men of manly age and discreet 
judgment. Of all the royal and mitred abbeys in 
the land ours was chiefest after Glastonbury and 
St. Albans ; and assuredly we have some honours 
and privileges which those two more ancient houses 
have not. I, who have taken up the pen in mine 
old age to record upon enduring parchment some 
of the passages I witnessed in my youth and ripe 
manhood, would not out of any unseemly vanity 
perpetuate my name and condition ; I would lie, 
unnamed, among the humblest of this brotherhood 
who have lived or will live without praise, and 
have died or will die without blame ; but as the 
world in after-time may wish to know who it was 
that told the story I have now in hand, and what 
were my opportunities of knowing the truth, it 
may be incumbent on me to say so much as this :■ — 
John JFitz-John of Sunning was my secular name 
and my designation in the world of pomps and 
vanities ; my mother was of the Saxon, my father 
of the Norman race ; my mother (I say a requiem 
for her daily) descended from a great Saxon earl, 
or, as some do say, prince ; and my father's grand- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 9 

father, who fought at the battle of Hastings, was 
cup-bearer to William the Conqueror, in sort that 
if I could be puffed up with mundane greatness I 
have the wherewithal : my name in religion is Felix, 
of the order of St. Benedict and of the Abbey of 
Reading ; and as a servant of the servants of the 
Lord, I have filled without discredit, in the course 
of many years, the several high offices of sub- 
sacrist and sacrist, refectorarius, cellarer, chamber- 
lain, and sub-prior ; and mayhap when I shall be 
gone hence some among this community will say 
that there have been worse officials than Father 
Felix. 

In the year eleven hundred and thirty-seven I 
was but a youthful novice, still longing after the 
flesh-pots of Egypt, and mourning for the loss of 
the worldly liberty I had enjoyed or abused in my 
mother's house at Sunning, which was a goodly 
house near the bank of Thamesis, on a wooded 
hill hard by the wooden old Saxon bridge of Sun- 
ning. But I was old enough to comprehend most 
of the passing events ; and being much favoured 
and indulged by the lord abbat and several of the 
brotherhood, I heard and saw more than the other 
novices, and was more frequently employed upon 
embassages beyond the precincts of the abbey 
lands. It was a common saying in the house 
that Felix the Sunningite, though but little given 
to his books within doors, was the best of boys for 
out-door work. By the favour of our Ladie, the 
love of in-door studies came upon me afterwards 
at that time when I was first assailed by podagra, 
and since that time have I not read all the forty 
and odd books that be in our library, and have £ 
not made books with mine own hand, faithfully 



10 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

transcribing' the Confessions of St. Augustin, and 
the whole of the Life of St. Benedict, and missals 
not a few ? But not to me the praise and glory, 
sed no mini tuo ! 

As I was born in the house at Sunning (may the 
sun ever shine upon that happy village, and upon 
the little church wherein rests the mortal part 
of my mother) on the eve of St. John the Evan- 
gelist, io the year of our Redemption eleven hun- 
dred and twenty, being the twentieth year of the 
Beauclerc's reign, I was, on the feast of St. Edbert, 
Bishop and Confessor, in the year eleven hundred 
and thirty- seven, close upon the eighteenth year of 
mine age. 

St. Edbert's festival, falling in the flowering 
month of May, is one which my heart hath always 
much affected. The house had kept it right mer- 
rily ; and notwithstanding the unfinished state of 
portions of the abbey, I do opine that our ceremo- 
nies in church and choir were that day very mag- 
nificent, and fit to be a pattern to some other 
houses. All labours were suspended ; for he is a 
niggard of the worst sort that begrudgeth even 
his serfs and bondmen rest at such a tide ; and 
eager as was our lord abbat Edward for the com- 
pletion of our stately edifice, and speciliater for the 
finishing of our dormitory, he would not allow a 
man to chip a stone, or put one flint upon another, 
or hew or shape wood upon St. Edbert's day ; and 
he was almost angered at the Italian limner for 
finishing part of a glory which he had begun in 
our Ladie's chapel. It was a memorable day, and, 
inter alia, for this : it was the first night that the 
good lord abbat slept within the walls of the 
abbey ; for hitherto, on account of the cold and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 11 

dampness of the new walls, be had betaken himself 
for his nightly rest either to a hou>e ch»e by in 
the town of Reading, or to the house of a God- 
fearing relation, who dwelt on the other side of 
Thamesis at Caversham. 

After the completorium and supper (we had 
both meat and wine of the best at that co-na), the 
weather being warm, and the evening altogether 
beautiful, the abbat and reverend fathers, as well 
as the younger members of the house, gathered 
ther in my lord abbat's garden at the back of 
the abbey, and sat there for a season on the green 
bank of the Kennet, looking at the bright river 
as it glided by, and at the young moon and 
twinkling stars that were reflected in the water, or 
diseoursing with one another upon sundry cheerful 
topics. Good cheer had made me cheerful, and it 
remembers me that 1 made little coronals and 
chains of the violets that grew by the river bank, 
and of the bright-eyed daises that covered all the 
sward, and threw them upon the gliding and ever- 
changing surface of the Kennet, and said, as I had 
done in my still happier childhood, " Get ye down 
to Sunning bridge, and stop not at this bank or 
on that, but go ye right down to Sunning, and 
tell my mother that I am happy with my shaven 
crown." 

The lord abbat, looking back upon the tall tower 
of our church, and the broad massive walls of our 
Aula Magna, said — 

" In veritate, this is a goodly and substantial 
house, and one fitted to beautify holiness.'' 

" In truth is it," said that good and learned 
Italian father who had brought the limner from 
Pisa. 



12 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

* Torpietro," said the abbat, " this soil grows 
no marble ; we have not hereabout the nitent 
blocks of Carrara, or the soberer marble of Lucca ; 
we have neither granite nor freestone ; but rounded 
chalk-hills have we, and flints love the chalk-pit, 
and the pits of Caversham are inexhaustible ; and 
with our mortar, rubble, and flints, we have built 
walls three fathoms thick, and have made an abbey 
which will stand longer than your Italian temples, 
built of stone and marble ; for time, that corrodes 
and consumes other substances, makes our cement 
the harder and stronger. Somewhat rough are 
they on the outside, like the character of our na- 
tion ; but they are compact and sound within, and 
not to be moved or shaken — no, scarcely by an 
earthquake.'' 

" 'Tis a substantial pile," quoth Torpietro. 
u Balestra, nor catapult, nor manginall, nor the 
mightiest battering-ram, will ever breach these 
walls ; and therefore is the house safe against any 
attack of war, and therefore will it stand, entire as 
it now is, when a thousand years are gone." 

" Nay," said the abbat, " name not war : a 
sacred place like this is not to be assaulted ; and 
our good and brave King Stephen is now firmly 
and rightfully seated, and we shall have no in- 
testine trouble. We have no fig-trees, or I would 
quote to thee, Brother Torpietro, that passage 
which saith .... Felix, my son, leave off throw- 
ing flowers in the stream ; run unto the gate, and 
see what is toward, for there be some who smite 
upon the gate with unwonted violence, and it is 
now past the curfew." 

When the abbat first spoke to me, I heard a 
mighty rapping, which I had not heard before, or 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 13 

had not heeded, being lost in a reverie as I 
watched my coronals on their voyage towards 
Sunning bridge ; but when his lordship spake to 
me, I hurried across the narrow garden, and into 
the house, and up to the outer gate, where I found 
Humphrey, the old janitor, and none but he. 
Humphrey had opened the wicket, and had closed 
it again, before I came to the gate. " Felix, thou 
good boy of Sunning," said he unto me, " thou art 
as nimble as the buck of the forest, and art ever 
willing to make thy young limbs save the limbs 
of an old man, so prithee take this corbel, and bear 
it to my lord abbat's presence forthwith, and bear 
it gently and with speed, for those who left it said 
there was delicate stuff within, which must not be 
shaken, but which must be opened by the lord 
abbat right soon. So take it, good Felix, for 
there is no lay-brother at hand, and the weight is 
nought. " 

I took up the corbel gently under my left arm, 
and began to stride with it to the abbat, down at 
the Kennet banks. I was presently there, for 
albeit the corbel was of some size, the weight 
thereof was indeed as nothing. 

ki So, so," said my lord abbat, as he espied me 
and my burthen, M What have we here?" 

" Doubtless," said the then refectorarius, " some 
little donation from the faithful. Venison is not 
as yet ; but lamb is in high perfection at this 
season." 

" Nay," quoth the coquinarius, " from the shape 
of the wicker, I think it is rather some sizeable 
pike, sent down by our friends and brothers at 
Pangbourne." 

" Bethinks me rather," said the lord abbat, 

b3 



14 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

waving his right hand over the corbel (the jewels 
and bright gold of his finger-rings glittering in the 
young moon as he did it), " bethinks me rather 
that it is a collation of simnels from our chaste 
sisters the nuns of Wargrave, who ever and anon 
do give a sign of life and love to us the Bene- 
dictines of Reading Abbey. But open, Felix ! 
cut the withies, and undo the basket-lid, and let us 
see with our own eyes." 

As my curiosity was now at the least as great as 
that of any of my superiors in age and dignity, 
I cut the slight bindings, and undid the corbel ; 
and then there lay, uncovered and revealed to sight 
— the most beautiful babe mine eyes ever beheld 
withal ! 

" Benedicamus I" said the lord abbat, gazing 
and crossing himself. 

" Miserere ! The Lord have mercy upon us ! 
But what thing have we here ?" quoth the prior. 

" 'Tis a marvellous pretty infant," said the 
limner from Pisa, " and would do to paint for one 
of the cherubim in the chapel of our Ladie." 

" A marvellously pretty devil," said our then 
sub-prior, a sourish man, and somewhat overmuch 
given to suspicious and evil thoughts of his bro- 
thers and neighbours : " What have we celiba- 
tarians and Benedictines to do with little babies ? 
I smell mischief here — mischief and irregularity. 
Felix, what knowest thou of this corbel ? I hope 
thou knowest not all too much ! But know all or 
know nothing, why, oh boy, didst bring this ar- 
canum into this reverend company ?" 

" Father," said I, " 'twas Humphrey bade me 
bring it, and for all the rest I know nothing ;" 
and this being perfectly true, yet did I hold down 



A LEGEND OF HKAIUV; AlICl.V. 15 

my head, for that I felt the blood all glow in g in 

ii i \ face, not knowing how or why it should be BO. 
Bid the janitor to onr procnce," said the lord 
abbat. 

Humphrey, who had nothing doubted that the 
ba>ket contained some creature comforts, Mich as 
the faithful not unfre<piently sent to our hOQJPj 
soon appeared, and \wh not a little amazed to tee 
the amazement of the monk-, and the Ugh dis- 
pleasure of the abbat ; for as a»v had somewhat 
dimmed hifl sight, and as the last irleams of twi- 
light were now dying awa\\ the good janitor did 

not perceive the Bleeping babe. 

M Humphrey," Bald the abbat, "what is this 
thou ha>t m nt m r Tell me, in the name of the 

saints, w h»> -a\ 6 thee this ba>k« 

Aa the abbat spoke the infant awoke from its 

slumber, and began to crv out, and lay Hi anus 
al)out, as if feeling fof it> nurse ; and hereat our 
old janitor's wonderment being manifoldly in- 
creased, he started hack, and crossed himself, and 
said, "Jem Maria! Jem Maria;*' 

•• Say what thou hast to say," oU <>nr sacrist ; 
M my lord abhat would know who left this corbel 
at the gate, and why thou didst take it in ?" 

u lint." -aid the old janitor, making that reve- 
rence to his superiors which he WM bounden to do, 
M may I ask what it is that the corbel hole 

M A babe." said the prior. 

u And of the feminine gender — to make the 
matter worse," said the teacher of the Novices. 

u 'lis witchcraft," said Humphrey — M 'tis nought 
but witchcraft ! What Christian man, or woman 
either, could ever think of sending a babe to the 
monks of Reading !" 



16 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

" But who sent the basket ?" said the abbat. 

" That know I not," said old Humphrey, still 
crossing himself. 

" Then who left it with thee ?" asked the sacrist. 

" Two serfs that I have seen at this house afore- 
time," said Humphrey — " two honest-visaged churls, 
who were out of breath when they came to the 
wicket, and who went away to the westward so 
soon as they had put the basket in my hands, and 
told me to handle it gently, and carry it to my 
lord abbat forthwith." 

" And said they nothing more?" quoth the 
prior. 

" Yea, they did say there was delicate stuff 
within." 

" And what stuff didst thou think it was ?" said 
the coquinarius. 

" Verily something to eat or drink." 

" Thou art stolid," said the sour sub-prior ; 
" thou art stolid, oh Humphrey, to take a corbel 
from strange men. Wouldst know the serfs 
again ?" 

" I should know them again if I could but see 
them again. Seen them I have aforetime. Whose 
men they be I know not ; but I thought I had seen 
them before bring gifts and offerings to our house ; 
and it is not in my office to open anything that is 
shut, except the convent-door ; and ill would it 
have beseemed me to have been prying into a 
basket left for my lord abbat." 

" But said the churls nothing else?" asked the 
abbat. " Bethink thee, oh Humphrey ! said the 
churls nought else ?" 

" Methinks that when I asked them whose men 
they were, and who had sent this present, one of 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 17 

them did make reply that my lord abbat would 
know right well." 

Here all our eyes were bent upon the good 
abbat, who, to tell the truth, did look somewhat 
conturbated. But when the head of our house had 
recovered from this sudden emotion, he said to the 
janitor, " Were those the very words the man did 
speak ?" 

" The matter of the words was that," said Hum- 
phrey ; " yet I do think the slaves subjoined that 
if your lordship knew not who sent the gift, your 
lordship would soon know right well. But as the 
churl was walking away while he was speaking, 
I cannot say that these were his ipsissima verba" 

" Janitor," quoth the abbat, " knowest thou 
what festival of mother church it is we have cele- 
brated this day?" 

" The feast of the blessed Saint Edbert," re- 
sponded Humphrey, with a genuflexion and an ora 
pro nobis. 

" Then from this day forward," quoth the lord 
abbat, " take not and admit not within these gates 
any donation or thing whatsoever from men that 
thou knowest not, and that run from our door 
instead of tarrying to refresh themselves in the 
hospitium." 

" That last unwonted and unnatural fact," quoth 
the cellarer, " ought to have warned thee, oh Hum- 
phrey, that there was mischief in the corbel." 

" But," replied the janitor, " it was past the 
time of even' prayer, nay, after supper-time ; and 
they did place the basket in my hands, and vanish 
away all in a minute, and I could not throw the 
corbel after them, nor could I leave it outside the 
gate. But mischief did I suspect none." 



18 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Humphrey being dismissed, the elders of our 
house debated what had best be done with the 
child, which had not ceased crying all this while, 
and which moved my heart to pity, for it was a 
beautiful babe to look upon, and it seemed right 
hungry, and witchcraft could there be none about 
it ; for our sub-prior, who had adventured to take 
it up in his arms, had espied a little golden cross 
round its neck, and an Agnus Dei sewed to its 
clothes. The lord abbat, whose heart was always 
kind to man, woman, and child, nay, even unto the 
beasts in the stable and field, and the hounds of 
the chase, said that albeit it had been cast into a 
wrong place, it was assuredly a sweet innocent 
and most Christian-looking child, and that as the 
hour was waxing very late, it would be well to 
keep it in the house until the morrow morn. But 
the sub-prior bade his lordship bethink himself of 
the sex of the child, and of the rigid rule of our 
order, which, in its strictest interpretation, would 
seem to imply that nothing of the sex feminine 
should ever abide by night within our cloisters. 
" In spite of its cross and agnus," subjoined the 
sour suspicious man, " I must opine that this 
piping baby hath been sent hither by some secret 
enemy, in order to bring down discredit and asper- 
sions upon our community." 

" But what, in the name of the Virgin, 
wouldst have us do with the little innocent ?" said 
the abbat. 

" Peradventure," quoth the sub-prior, " it were 
not badly done to set the brat afloat in its basket 
down the Kennet into Thamesis. It may ground 
among the rushes, and be found by the country 
people, or it may " 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 19 

" Brother/* said the abbat, " thy heart is wax- 
ing as hard as the flint of our walls ! I would not 
do that thing, or see it done, to escape all the 
calumnies which all the evil tongues of England 
could heap ui)on me." 

" No, assuredly, nor would I," said the sub- 
prior ; "for upon after-thought it doth appear that 
the babe perchance might drown. Still, my lord 
abbat, it is not well that it should stay where it is, 
or that the town-folk of Heading should know that 
it hath been brought to our door ; for they have too 
many bad stories already, and some of them do 
remember the wicked marrying priests of the days 
of the Bed King." 

" True, oh sub-prior," quoth the lord abbat ; 
;i true and well-bethought. We must not, there- 
fore, send the child into Reading town ; but I will 
have it conveyed unto my good nephew at Caver- 
sham, and his wife will have care of it until we 
shall learn whose babe it is, and why so mysteri- 
ously sent hither. There is gentle blood in those 
veins ; this is no churl's child. I never saw a 
more beautiful babe, and in my time I have bap- 
tized many an earl's daughter, ay, and more than 
one little princess. It must be a strange tale that 
which shall explain how the mother could ever 
part with such an infant. But it grows dark ; so, 
Philip, take up the basket, and bear it straightway 
and with all care and gentleness to Caversham ; 
and Felix, do thou go with Philip, and salute my 
kinsman in my name, and relate unto him the 
strange and marvellous manner in which the basket 
hath been brought into our house, and tell him I 
will see him in the morning after service." 

Philip was an honest lay-brother of the house, 



20 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and between him and me there had always been 
much friendship ; for on ray first coming to the 
abbey, to be trained to religion and learning, he 
had procured many little indulgences for me, and 
had ofttimes taken me behind him on his horse 
when he rode towards Sunning to look after a 
farm which my lord abbat had near to that place. 
He was a mirthful man, and so fond of talk, that 
when he had not me riding behind him he usually 
discoursed all the way with his horse. Now he 
took up the corbel with as much gentleness as a 
lady's nurse, and we began to go on our way, the 
dear child still piping and bewailing. The sub- 
prior followed us to the gate to give Humphrey 
the needful order to open, for at that hour the 
janitor would not have allowed egress to any lay- 
brother or novice. 6i Beshrew me," said old Hum- 
phrey as the sub-prior withdrew, " but this found- 
ling hath brought trouble upon me and sharp 
words ; yet let me see its face, good Philip, for I 
hear 'tis a Christian child, and a lovely." 

Hereupon we took the basket into Humphrey's 
cell by the gate, where a light was burning ; and 
the janitor having peered in its face, vowed, as 
others had done, that he had not seen so fair a 
babe. " 'Tis nine months old, at the very least," 
said he ; " and ye may tell by its shrill piping that 
'tis a strong and healthy child. Mayhap it cries 
for hunger ;" and at this timeous thought the old 
janitor brought forth a little milk and honey and 
gave it to the babe, who partook thereof, and then 
smiled and dropped fast asleep. 

We took the shortest path across the King's 
Mead to Caversham bridge. As we walked along 
Philip ceased not from talking about the child and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 21 

the unprecedented way in which it had been left 
at the abbey. Being a man much given to specu- 
lation and the putting of this thing and that toge- 
ther, he made sundry surmises which I will not 
repeat, for they touched the good lord abbat, and 
the next morning proved that though very inge- 
nious they had no foundation in truth. When we 
came to the long wooden bridge, we found, as we 
had expected, that part of it was raised, and that the 
old man that levied the toll for the baron was fast 
asleep. But our shouting soon roused the toll- 
man, and he soon challenged us and lowered the 
draw-bridge, though not without sundry expres- 
sions of astonishment that two monks should be 
abroad at so late an hour. When we told him 
whither we were going, he bade us make haste, for 
the lights were disappearing in the mansion, and 
the family would soon be buried in sleep. He 
then lowered the draw-bridge at the other end, and 
we went on towards the hill side with hasty steps, 
the only light visible in the mansion being one that 
shone brightly through the casement of the south- 
ern turret. 

" Ralpho, the toll-man," said I, " must have 
been more than half asleep, or assuredly he would 
have asked what we were carrying in the basket at 
this time o'night." 

" May the babe have an extra blessing, quoth 
Philip, " for that it sleeps on and did not wake on 
the bridge ! A pretty tale would gossip Ealpho 
have had to tell about us Benedictines if the babe 
had set up its piping on the bridge !" 

The castellum or baronial mansion stood on the. 
top of Caversham hill at the point where that hill 
is steepest ; the village lay at its feet, and the.. 



22 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

church then stood midway between the castle and 
the village. We were soon at the edge of the dry- 
moat ; but the draw -bridge was up, and we had to 
shout and blow the cow-horn for some time before 
we could make ourselves heard by any one within ; 
and when the warder awoke and looked forth he 
was in no good humour. But as we made our- 
selves known, and told him that we came from the 
lord abbat upon an occasion that brooked no delay, 
he altered his tone ; and after telling us that though 
bedward, he believed his lord and ladie were not 
yet in bed, as he could see a light in their bower 
above, he lowered the draw-bridge and unbarred 
the wicket. That which Ralpho had omitted to 
do on the bridge, the warder did under the gate- 
way of the castle ; for, pointing to the basket, he 
said, " What have we here, brother Philip ? Cates 
and sweetmeats for my lord and ladie ? Ay, 
Reading Abbey is famed for its confections !" 

He had scarcely said the words when a noise 
came from the basket which made him start back 
and cross himself; for the dear child began to pipe 
and scream, and much more loudly methought 
that I had heard it do before. We, however, 
stayed not to talk with the astonished warder ; for 
a waiting- woman had come down from the southern 
turret to inquire what was toward, and we fol- 
lowed this good woman, who was still more aston- 
ished than the warder, to the chamber where the 
lord and ladie were. Sir Alain de Bohun was a 
bountiful lord, ever kind of heart and gentle in 
speech ; and the Ladie Alfgiva, his wife, de- 
scended from the Saxon thanes who had once 
owned and held all the country from Caversham 
to Maple-Durham, was the gentlest, truest ladie, 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 23 

and at this season one of the fairest that lived any- 
where in Berkshire or Oxfordshire. Before hearing 
the short tale we had to tell, Sir Alain vowed that 
the little stranger was welcome, and that so sweet 
a foundling should never want home or nurture 
while lie had a roof-tree to sit under ; and the ladie 
took the child in her arms, and kissed it, and 
pacified it ; and before I had gotten half through 
my narration, and the message from my lord abbat, 
the babe went to sleep on the ladie's bosom. Our 
limner from Pisa ought to have seen that sight ; 
for the Madonna and Child he did afterwards paint 
for the chapel of our Ladie was not so beautiful 
and tender a picture as that presented to mine eye 
by the wife of Sir Alain de Bohun and our little 
foundling. Much marvelled the gentle ladie at 
the tale ; but her other feelings were stronger than 
her curiosity and astonishment ; and she soon 
withdrew to place the child with her own dear 
children — a little boy some four or five years old, 
and a little girl not many months older than the 
stranger. Sir Alain gave to the lay-brother Philip 
a piece of money, and to me a beaker of wine, and 
so dismissed us with a right courteous message to 
our abbat and his good and right reverend uncle. 

The warder would have stayed us to explain 
how it was that monks went about in the hours of 
night with a babe in a basket ; but as he had a sharp 
wit and a ribald tongue, we forbore to answer his 
questions, and recommending him to the saints that 
keep w r atch by night, and telling him it was too 
late for talk, we began to return rapidly by the 
way we had come. As Ralpho let us across 
Caversham bridge he bemoaned the hardness of 
his life, and complained that Sir Alain put him to 



24 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

much unnecessary trouble in a time of peace and 
tranquillity, when the bridge might very well be 
left open by night and by day without fear of the 
passage of foes. Alack ! before the next morning 
dawned Ralpho was made to know that Sir Alain's 
caution was very needful. Scarcely had Philip 
and I gotten a rood from the bridge-end when that 
honest lay-brother shouted " Fire ! Fire ! a fire !" 
and looking to the west, the sky behind the town 
and hills of Reading seemed all in a blaze. The 
young moon had set ; but as we came to the King's 
Mead our path was lighted by a glaring red light, 
which seemed every instant to become stronger and 
redder. " Eheu !" said Philip, who knew every 
township better than I then knew my Litany ; 
" Eheu ! there is mischief afoot ! The flames 
mount in the direction of Tilehurst and Sulham 
and Charlton ! More than one township is a- 
burning !" 

I looked down the river, and joyed to see that 
there was no sign of conflagration at Sunning, and 
returned thanks therefore to my patron saint. 

We were now running across the mead as fast 
as we could run ; but before we came to the abbey- 
gate the alarm-bell rung out from the tower, and 
a loud shouting and crying came from the town of 
Reading, and the sounds of another alarm-bell from 
Sir Alain's castellum at Caversham. 

" What can this mean ?" said Philip. " The two 
serfs that brought the babe to our house came from 
the westward, or did go back in that direction, or 
so said old Humphrey. After twenty years and 
more of a happy peace, is this land to be wasted 
again by factions and civil war ?" 

Alas ! Philip had said it ! This night wit- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 25 

nessed the beginning of those troubles which car- 
ried woe into every part of England, and which 
ended not until sixteen long years had passed over 
our heads, sending some of our brotherhood with 
sorrow to the grave, and making others old men 
before their time ; for, to say nothing of our per- 
sonal sufferings and hazards, there was not one 
among us but had a brother or a sister and friends 
near and dear to him tortured or butchered in 
these the worst wars that were ever waged in Eng- 
land. 

When we returned into the abbey we found that 
the lord abbat had called up his men-at-arms, 
and the three good knights who did military service 
for the abbey in return for the lands they held ; 
that one of these knights and divers of the men-at- 
arms were mounting and about to go forth ; and 
that the better conditioned of the town people of 
Reading were already bringing their goods and 
chattels to our house for protection ; for the walls 
of the town had been allowed to fall into ruin 
during the long and happy peace which Henricus 
Primus had kept in the land, and our burghers had 
almost wholly lost the art military. Some of these 
men, w r ho had been to the hills, said that the whole 
country was on fire from Inglesfleld to Tilehurst, 
and from Tilehurst to Purley, which news de- 
stroyed the hope our good abbat had been enter- 
taining that the fire might be accidental and con- 
fined to the thatch-covered houses of one village 
or township. And, in very deed, by this time the 
whole west seemed to be burning, and the welkin 
to be overcast by smoke and flame, and a reflected 
lurid and horrible light. The swift stream of the 
Kennet looked as though its waters had been trans- 



26 A LEGEND OP READING ABBEY. 

muted into red wine, and the broad Thamesis 
shined like a path of fire. No eye closed for sleep 
in the abbey that night ; and it was not until a full 
hour after the scarcely perceptible dawn of day 
that certain intelligence was brought us as to the 
causes and parties which had thus begun to turn 
our pleasant and fruitful land into a wilderness. 



( 27 ) 



II. 



We had sung matins in the choir, and had nearly 
finished chanting lauds, when three knights of 
good fame, to wit, Sir Hugh de Basildon, Sir Hugh 
Fitzhugh, of Purley, and Sir Walter de Courcy, 
from Inglesfield, arrived at the abbey, and de- 
manded speech of our superiors. So soon as the 
service permitted, the lord abbat, the prior, and 
the other obedientiarii of our house retired into 
the abbat's garden with these worthy knights, who 
were in great haste, insomuch that they would 
neither stay to partake of my lord's collation, which 
was now nigh upon being ready, nor allow the 
saddles to be taken from their wearied horses. 
They stayed but a short while in the garden, and 
then remounting their steeds, they spurred away 
for Cavers ham, bidding the burghers of Reading 
and a number of serfs, who had collected outside 
our gates, to look after their bows and arrows, 
and to get such other weapons as they could, and 
to stand upon their defence, as traitors to King 
Stephen were abroad and might be soon upon them. 
These good people made loud lamentation, for they 
were ill prepared and provided, and they could not 
divine who these enemies and night burners could 
be. We, the humbler members of the house, were 
alike ignorant ; but after he had refreshed his in- 



28 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

ward man, the good abbat came forth and addressed 
us all, and the people without the gate, in this 
wise : — 

" My brothers and children, and ye good men of 
Reading, who be also my children, lift up your 
voices and say with me, God save King Stephen, 
the rightful king of this realm, and down with the 
traitors who would shake his throne !" 

Having all of us shouted as we were bidden to 
do, and with right good will, for King Stephen at 
this time was much loved in the land, my lord 
abbat continued his oration. 

" The case," said he, " stands thus. That un- 
godly restless woman, the undutiful daughter of 
our late pious King Henry, whose body rests within 
these walls — that presumptuous Matilda, once Em- 
press, but now nought but Countess of Anjou, hath 
sent over her bastard half-brother Robert, Earl of 
Gloucester, to claim the throne of England as her 
right ; as if the martial nobility and bold people of 
this land could ever be governed by a woman, and 
as if Stephen, our good king and the well-beloved 
nephew of our late King Henry, who appointed him 
to be his successor, had not been elected with the 
consent of the baronage, clergy, and people of Eng- 
land, and confirmed in his lawful seat by our lord 
the Pope ! Now this traitorous Earl of Gloucester, 
after taking the oaths of fealty and homage to King 
Stephen, and obtaining by the act possession of his 
great estates in this realm, hath suddenly lifted up 
the mask and thrown down the gauntlet, and 
sundry false barons like himself have followed his 
pernicious example, and are now raging through 
the country, seizing upon the king's towns and 
castles, treacherously surprising the castles of 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 29 

honest lords and good knights, and burning the 
homes and destroying the lives of all such as will 
not join them, or of all such as hold the manors 
and lands these traitors desire to be possessed of. 
In the east Hugh Bigod, steward of the late king's 
household, and the very man who made oath before 
the Archbishop of Canterbury and the other great 
lords of the realm, as well lay as ecclesiastic, that 
King Henry on his death-bed did adopt and choose 
his nephew Stephen to be his successor, because 
this Matilda, Countess of Anjou, had been an un- 
dutiful child unto him, and had given him many 
and grievous offences, and was by her sex disquali- 
fied for the succession ; this Hugh Bigod, I say, 
hath in the east seized Norwich Castle and hoisted 
thereupon the banner of this Angevin Countess. 
In the west the Earl of Gloucester hath armed all 
his vassals, and is calling upon all such friends as 
hope to better their worldly fortunes by deluging 
the country with blood and wasting it with fire. 
Some of these evil men have raised the banner of 
war in our quiet neighbourhood, and have fallen 
with merciless fury upon some of our noblest and 
best neighbours, taking them by foul treachery and 
surprisal, and waging war upon women and chil- 
dren, and unarmed serfs, in the absence of their 
lords. Yesterday a great band of these traitors 
marched from the vicinage of Windsore, and, last 
night, after a foul plunder and butchery of the 
people, the townships of Basildon, Whitechurch, 
Purley, Tidmersh, Tilehurst, Sulham, Theal, and 
Speen were given to the flames. Sir Ingelric, of 
Huntercombe, who hath ever been held as a loyal 
and fearless knight, and whose noble mate could 
trace her Saxon ancestry beyond the days of King 



30 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Alfred, was not at his home, but his fair young 
wife being forewarned of their coming, made fast 
the gates and defended the manor-house for divers 
hours : but, woe is me ! the evil men set fire to the 
house, and — combusta est, it is burned, with the 
gentle dame and all that were in it ! The brave 
Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe was not there, or 
mayhap " 

" Ingelric of Huntercombe is here," cried that 
dark and sad-looking knight, who had just arrived 
on a panting steed ; " Ingelric of Huntercombe is 
here, with a soul athirst for vengeance ! But, my 
child ! My lord abbat, tell me of my babe !" 

The fearful conflagration, which had made us all 
think of the day of judgment, had caused my lord 
abbat, as well as the rest of us, to forget the little 
stranger that had come in the basket, not without 
bringing some trouble to him and to some of us ; 
but his lordship soon collected his thoughts, and 
seeing how the matter stood, he clasped in his arms 
the knight, who had dismounted from his horse, 
and said to him in his kind fatherly voice, u Sir 
Ingelric, may the saints vouchsafe thee strength to 
bear the woe that hath befallen thee ; but thy child 
is safe." 

" Let me see her," said the knight ; " let me 
hold her in mine arms ; her mother shall I never 
see more ! Her sweet body hath been consumed 
in the fire that hath left me without a home ! 
I can see my wife no more — no, not even in death ! 
But let me have sight of my child !" 

The abbat then explained in a few words where 
the child was, and in what good and tender keep- 
ing ; and while he was doing this, Humphrey, our 
old janitor, looking steadfastly at a churl who had 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 31 

dismounted to hold Sir Ingelric's horse, and at 
another serf, who remained mounted, he said aloud, 
" These be the two knaves that gave me the 
basket !" and then entering into short converse 
with the men, Humphrey brought out these facts : — 
At the near approach of the danger, of which she 
had been forewarned, their mistress had given her 
child to them, with charge to hasten with it to 
Reading Abbey, and then to make all possible 
speed back to Tilehurst, whither, as she had fondly 
hoped, her lord would be returned before his ene- 
mies could do her harm, for Sir Ingelric had gone 
to no greater distance than to Wallingford, and a 
messenger had been despatched after him on the only 
fleet horse he had left in the stable, and well did 
she know that the love her husband bore her 
would bring him rapidly to her rescue. This was 
all we learned now,4)ut we afterwards learned that 
the messenger on the fleet horse had been inter- 
cepted and slain ; that the manor-house had been 
stormed and set on fire before the two serfs who 
had brought the child to Reading could get back ; 
and that, at this sad sight, the said two bondmen, 
full of devotion for their lord, had thrown them- 
selves into the woods, and had gone a wearisome 
journey on foot in search of him, and had met 
their master between night and morning near 
North Stoke Ford, for the conflagration had been 
seen at Wallingford, and had filled the heart of 
Sir Ingelric with awful presentiments, albeit he 
and no other man could at first conceive the cause 
and nature of the mischief which had so suddenly 
broken out in a time of the most perfect tran- 
quillity. When Sir Ingelric had understood that 
which had befallen, he had well nigh died of sud- 

c2 



32 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

den horror ; but, rousing himself to vengeance, he 
had collected a few honest men and some horses, 
and had ridden with all speed to our abbey, being 
but too surely confirmed on his way, by a few of 
his serfs who had escaped, of the fate his fair young 
wife had met in the manor-house. Never did I 
see a face fuller of woe than was that of Sir 
Ingelric of Huntercombe when our good abbat, 
taking him by the hand, led him within the house, 
to give him ghostly consolation, and to commune 
with him upon the measures which ought to be 
adopted for the defence of the country. But 1 
should tell how that, before our lord abbat quitted 
the outer gate, he gave commandment that the 
draw-bridge, which had not been raised for many 
a day, should be hauled up, and that the serfs of 
our abbey lands should be set to work to deepen 
the ditch, and to dig a new trench right down to 
the Kennet. Albeit no enemy was visible, the 
townfolk of Reading and all the simple hinds that 
had assembled were seized with a mighty conster- 
nation when we began to take measures for heaving 
up the bridge and closing our strong iron-bound 
gate. By order of the prior many of the better 
sort were admitted into our outer court, with their 
wives and children, as well as their property. 
Those who remained without wrung their hands, 
but departed not, for they felt that the very shadow 
of our holy walls would be a better protection unto 
them than any other they could find ; and certes 
we would have brought them within those walls in 
case of extremity ; for was not our house the asy- 
lum of the unhappy as well as the refugium pec- 
catorum ? 

When Sir Ingelric had communed until the be- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 33 

grinning" of tierce with our lord abbat, and had 
been somewhat restored by prayer and exhortation, 
and by meat and wine, he came out and called for 
his horse. But the abbat noted that the knight's 
horse needed rest, and so he ordered a fresh steed 
to be brought from his own stable, together with 
his own quiet grey palfrey, telling the brethren 
that he was minded to ride over to Caversham 
with Sir Ingelric to deliberate with his well- 
beloved nephew, who was too good a man of war 
to have omitted making some preparations against 
the threatening storm. " You will put up a prayer 
or twain for my safety," said the abbat to the prior, 
" and cause a Miserere, Domine, to be sung in the 
church. And thou wilt hold thyself ready, oh 
prior, to hurl an anathema at the head of the 
rebels, if they should come near unto this godly 
house ; and moreover thou wilt see to such war- 
harness and weapons as we do possess, and station 
the strongest-armed of our monks and lay-brothers, 
and the stoutest-hearted of our serfs, with our men- 
at-arms, in the tower and turrets, with bows and 
cross-bows ; for it may chance that those who re- 
spect not the Lord's anointed will have no respect 
for holy church that hath anointed him ; and when 
the children of Ishmael fall on, the children of 
Jacob may defend themselves with the arms of the 
flesh." 

Now our prior was a man of a very martial and 
fearless temperament, and one that well remem- 
bered how, in the times that were passed, bishops 
and abbats had put chain armour over their rockets 
and albs, and had ridden forth with lay-lords and 
men of war, and had ofttimes done battle for the 
cause which they held to be the just one, or the 



34 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

cause of the church. It is not for a humble ser- 
vant of mother church like me to decide whether 
such actions be altogether conformable to the 
councils of the church and the canons therein pro- 
pounded ; but this I do know, that the sword and 
battle-axe have wrought their effects upon stub- 
born and impenitent minds when our spiritual arms 
had failed, ay, when the wicked had laughed to 
scorn our interdicts and our very excommunica- 
tions. But not to press further this casus con- 
scientice, I will only record that our prior responded 
with a firm voice and willing heart to the warlike 
portions of our lord abbat's instructions, and that 
he, with marvellous alacrity, did arm the house 
and prepare to do battle. 

As the gate was unbarred and the draw-bridge 
again lowered to allow the abbat and Sir Ingelric 
to go forth for Caversham, those of our knights 
and men-at-arms who had ridden at an earlier hour 
to make reconnaissance, came back with loose 
bridle to report that a great battalia of the rebels 
was advancing upon the town of Reading by the 
western road. 

" Then," quoth our abbat, " is there no time to 
lose ;" and putting his foot in the bright silver 
stirrup, he got into his saddle without the least 
assistance, albeit he was a corpulent man, and had 
had podagra. Two of our knights and half of our 
men-at-arms rode after the lord abbat and Sir 
Ingelric of Huntercombe, but the rest tarried 
with us. 

" Remember," said the abbat, turning the head 
of his palfrey, and addressing the town-folk and 
the serfs, " remember well that ye be all true men 
unto King Stephen !" 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 35 

The poor people made a very feeble essay to 
shout " Long live King Stephen !" and then prayed 
that we would admit them in at the postern-gate 
if the rebels came nearer ; which thing we did now 
promise them to do. 

The lord abbat and his party, riding away at a 
hand gallop, were soon seen crossing at Caversham 
bridge ; and very soon after they had crossed, a 
goodly band of armed men was seen to take post 
on the opposite bank of the river, a little below 
the bridge. Except these armed men, not a man, 
woman, or child could be discovered anywhere ; 
for the shepherds and cowherds had driven their 
flocks and herds to the other side of Thamesis, and 
all the serfs and labouring people had fled either 
to our abbey walls or unto Caversham Castle. 
Only yesterday morning our green meadows and 
fruitful corn-fields had been full of life and joy 
and thoughtless song, but now they were solitary, 
and as sad and still as the grave. The wind, which 
blew freshly from the westward, still brought with 
it hideous drifts of smoke, which dirtied the bright 
blue sky, and a coarse pungent smell, which over- 
came the sweet odours that were emitted by our 
flowering hedge-rows and by the myriads of flowers 
which grew in the bright green meads and along 
the moist banks by the river side. It was all a 
Tartarus now ; but on that sunny, happy May 
morning of yesterday it was like being in paradise 
to stand on our outer turret and scent the breeze, 
and feast the eye on plain and hill, meadow, river, 
and woodland, and to hear the lark singing in the 
clear sky over our head, and the blackbird whistling 
in the brake at our feet. Not a bird of all that 
choir was left now : the foul smoke and the pun- 



36 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

gent smell had scared them all away, as JEtna and 
Vesuve are said to do when they vomit their sul- 
phureous fires. 

I was roused from some meditations of this sort 
by the scream of a trumpet, and by a chorus of 
rude voices that shouted, " The Empress for Eng- 
land ! Down with the usurper Stephen ! Long 
life to the Queen, and death to all who gainsay 
it J" 

And presently after hearing these sounds I saw 
the head of a great column wind round the castle- 
mound (whereon there was not now any castle de- 
serving of the name), and take the high road which 
runs from Reading town to Caversham bridge. 
Saint John the Evangelist to my aid, but it seemed 
a formidable host ! And there were many men- 
at-arms in the midst, and a company of well- 
mounted and fully appointed knights rode at the 
head of it. But our prior, after waxing very red 
and wrathful at the first sight, did say, upon better 
observance, that the mass of that host were but 
rascaille people, serfs that had slipped their collars, 
knaves that had no arms but staves and bludgeons, 
and that would not stand for a moment against a 
charge of horse, nay, nor even against a good flight 
of quarrels or long-bow arrows. 

" They will not win across the bridge," said the 
prior, " for the chains be up, and pass the river 
they cannot, for the skiffs be all on the other side, 
and there is no ford hereabout. But see, they 
halt ! And now they wheel round for the King's 
Mead ! Will the caitiffs hitherward ? Let them 
come — our walls be of flint. By the founder of 
our house, it is this way they come !" 

And in little more time than it takes to say the 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 37 

credo and pater-noster, the rebels crossed a brook 
which runs into Thamesis, and came midway into 
the King's Mead, with the head of their column 
pointing straight for our main gate. But who be 
those that follow them on the grey palfrey and 
dapple jennet ? By Saint John and Saint James, 
the patrons of our house, it is our good lord abbat, 
and it is that right-hearted man the mass-priest of 
Caversham, and the latter hath a white flag fas- 
tened to his saddle, and he upholds a golden 
banner whereon is depicted the effigies of Him 
who died for our sins, and taught that there was to 
be peace upon earth and good will among all men ! 
And see, the rebels halt, and our abbat and the 
mass-priest fearlessly ride up to their leaders, and 
discourse with them. Word can we hear not at 
this distance, but plainly do we discern, by the 
abbat's gestures, and by the frequent up-lifting of 
the holy standard, that the head of our house is 
earnestly recommending peace and repentance, the 
truce of God for the present, and agreement and 
reconciliation hereafter. Gentle are our lord 
abbat's actions, and no doubt his speech, albeit the 
rebels have set their impious feet upon the lands 
of our abbey ; but rude and outrageous are the 
gestures of those mailed knights that do confer 

with him And can their ungodly rage amount 

to this? Yea, verily, so it is ! One of them 

rides his big war-horse against the grey palfrey, 
and the lord abbat of Reading is jostled out of his 
seat, and lies prostrate on the grass — may it be soft 
beneath him ! 

Judge ye of the choler of our prior, and of the 
grief and anger of all of us that saw this shameful 

c 3 



38 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and sacrilegious sight. We shouted from our 
tower and turrets, " O turpissime ! " and the prior, 
standing upon the loftiest battlement, stretched out 
his hands towards the traitors in the King's Mead, 
even as Pope Leo did from the walls of Rome, 
when Attila and his pagans came on for the as- 
sault of the holy city. But the prior's first ana- 
thema was not said before our good abbat, assisted 
by the mass-priest of Caversham, was on his feet, 
and to all seeming not much the worse for his fall. 
He now spoke so loudly to the knights that we 
could hear the sound of his voice and distinguish 
some of his words, specialiter when he conjured 
them to depart quietly thence, and avoid the shed- 
ding of blood. It was plain that the savage crew 
would not listen to him ; and we saw him remount 
his palfrey, and turn his head back towards the 
bridge. We much feared that the rebels would 
lay violent hands upon him, and keep him as their 
prisoner ; but, nemo repente, this was but the be- 
ginning of the great wickedness ; and albeit im- 
pious factions did afterwards load the servants of 
the church with chains, and throw even bishops 
into noisome dungeons, and keep them there for 
ransom among toads and snakes, Jews and thieves, 
and other unclean men, this present band did offer 
no let or hindrance to our lord abbat or to the 
mass-priest, who went back at a good pace to 
Caversham bridge. 

" And now," quoth our prior, with a brightening 
eye, "we shall surely see some feat of war if Sir 
Alain be alive ! The foul rebels have refused to 
parley, and have atrociously wronged the would-be 
peace-maker. Ay, by the bones of King Henry, 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 39 

'tis as I thought ! The trumpets sound ! Sir 
Alain's lances are on the bridge ! May the saints 
give them the victory !" 

I, Felix the novice, being at the topmost part 
of all the abbey with Philip, the lay brother, who 
had been teaching me how to use the long bow, did 
now see a battalia rushing across the bridge, a 
mixed force of horse and foot, and did further per- 
ceive a good company of cross-bowmen descend the 
left bank of Thamesis as if their intent was to 
march below our abbey to Sunning. The battalia 
which crossed the bridge divided itself into two 
parts, of the which one inarched hastily along the 
road that leads right to the Castle-hill and town of 
Reading, while the other and major part struck 
across the meadows for the King's Mead, never 
halting or pausing until it was right in front of the 
rebels. With the party in the mead were seen the 
pennon and cognizances of Sir Alain de Bohun : it 
seemed but a small force compared with that which 
was opposed to it, but of horse Sir Alain seemed 
to have rather more than the adverse party. There 
was a short parley, the words of which we could 
not hear, but it was very short, and then we heard 
right well, from the one side the shout of " God 
for King Stephen !" and from the other " God for 
the Empress-queen !" and when they had thus 
shouted for a space, they joined battle. At first 
their superiority in number seemed to give the 
rebels the advantage ; and our prior was so trans- 
ported at this, that he clapped a coat of mail over 
his black gown, took a lance in his hand, and 
called for his horse, and would fain have gone forth 
with our knights and men-at-arms to charge the 
enemy in the rear. But, lo ! the cross-bows, of 



40 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

whom we bad lost sight, appeared on the river in 
skiffs, and in less than an Ave they landed on the 
right bank ; and then they formed in good order, 
and came on with quick steps to the right wing of 
the foe, and shooting close and all together, smote it 
sorely with their quarrels. And hereupon the 
rascaille people fell off from their leaders, and ran 
in much disorder across the meadows. Now that 
part of Sir Alain's battalion which had marched 
towards the Castle-hill set up a triumphant shout, 
and drove the fugards back again, and moved upon 
the other flank of the disordered rebel host. The 
serfs of the abbey-lands and the town-folk and others 
who had been cowering under our walls and even 
in our ditches, became full of heart at sight of the 
great success of Sir Alain's cross-bows and the 
easy victory the good knight of Caversham was 
now completing ; and this encouraged the prior to 
distribute bows and bills among them, and to throw 
open the abbey -gate and form a third line or bat- 
talia round the discomfited foe. Divers of our 
brotherhood did go forth with the prior, and even 
take a post in advance upon the Falbury-hill ; but 
I, Felix, having no commandment to the contrary, 
stayed where I was, in a very safe place, whence I 
could see all that chanced below. After making 
sundry desperate attempts to stop the flight of their 
pedones and bring them to a head again, the Em- 
press's knights, not without holes in their chain 
jerkins, began to fly themselves and to knock down 
and ride pitilessly over their own people. They 
could go no other gait than close by our abbey and 
across the Falbury ; and when they came near unto 
our force on the hillock, a stiffish flight of arrows 
and quarrels made them swerve and draw rein. At 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 41 

this juncture, Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, whose 
lance was red with blood, and whose casque had 
been knocked from his head by some terrible blow, 
and whose face was covered with blood in a manner 
fearful to look upon, came thundering among the 
rebel knights calling upon his mortal foe, that 
caitiff knight Sir Jocelyn de Brienne, to tarry and 
receive his inevitable doom as a felon traitor, 
coward, and foul murtherer. At these hard words 
Sir Jocelyn, who was aforetime a man of a very 
evil reputation, wheeled round his horse, and with 
his lance in rest charged Sir Ingelric, who was 
charging him. Sir Jocelyn, the prime leader of 
this first rebellion, and main actor in the horrible 
deeds of the over-night, was wounded and un- 
horsed, and lay on the hard ground of the Falbury 
(not on a soft mead like that on which he made 
fall our lord abbat) crying " Rescue ! rescue! 
Help me or I perish l" 

Ay ! there lay the proud strong man, struck 
down in his pride and strength, looking towards 
our abbey-gate, and upon the hospital for lepers, 
called the Hospital of St. Mary Magdalen, which 
Aucherius, the second abbat of our house, did 
build near to the great gate, and I ween that Sir 
Jocelyn would have changed his present estate even 
for that of a leper ! and still he cried " Rescue ! 
rescue ! Will no true man stop and save me ? ? ' 
But the knights and men-at-arms that had ridden 
with him could not stay to lift him up or give him 
any aid, for that Sir Alain de Bohun and his horse- 
men were now again close upon them, and therefore 
did they spur their steeds and gallop madly past 
some of the town-folk our prior had armed. Rings 
still in my ear the horrible voice with which the 



42 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

fallen and disabled Sir Joeelyn cried " Quarter ! 
quarter I" and called upon his foe to show mercy, 
and name what ransom he would ; and still my 
blood runs cold as I recall the manner in which Sir 
Ingelric of Huntercombe, dismounting, lifted up 
his enemy's coat of mail and drove under it into 
Sir Jocelyn's heart his long thick dagger, scream- 
ing, " Where was thy mercy last night ! Die un- 
confessed !" And Sir Joeelyn perished, and another 
knight and ten men-at-arms perished unshrieved 
upon our abbey lands, yea, and close unto our 
church and sacristy. Many that escaped were 
sorely wounded, and well upon two score of the 
commoner sort were made prisoners, either in the 
King's Mead or in the Falbury. Sir Ingelric of 
Huntercombe, mad with revenge, would have 
butchered all these captives on the Falbury -hill as 
a sacrifice to the manes of his beloved wife, but 
Sir Alain de Bohun stood between the wretched 
serfs and this great fury, and when our good and 
merciful lord abbat rode up on his grey palfrey, 
Sir Ingelric was somewhat pacified at his discourse. 
By the foundation charter which the Beauclerc had 
given us, it appertained to the lord abbat, and to 
none but him, to judge of offences committed upon 
the lands of the abbey ; yea, our lord abbat had the 
privileges of the hundred courts, and all manner of 
pleas, with soc and sac, infangtheof, and ham- 
sockna ; that is to say, he could try all causes, im- 
pose forfeitures, judge bondmen and villeins, with 
their children, goods and chattels, and try and 
punish any thief or housebreaker, or other evil- 
doer taken within our jurisdiction. All these 
rights and privileges were granted to the abbat of 
Heading Abbey in their fullest extent, with judicial 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 43 

power in all cases of assault, murder, breach of the 
peace, and the like ; in short, in as full extent as 
belonged to the royal authority. Lord Edward 
might have hanged every one of those prisoners by 
the neck to the trees on the Falbury, and none 
could have said him nay ; or he could have chopped 
off their hands and feet. But being of a merciful 
nature, he only made cut off the ears and slit the 
noses of a few of the churls, and then dismissed 
them all, as to keep them in prison would be trou- 
blesome and costly. And when this last thing was 
done, all the victorious party came into our church, 
where we the monks and novices did chant the Te, 
Deum, laudamits, after which our abbat delivered 
a learned discourse upon the rights of King Stephen, 
and put up a prayer for his preservation on the 
throne, 

Much bloodshedding and many horribly vindic- 
tive acts did the lord abbat prevent on this unhappy 
day : nevertheless much blood was shed, and a new 
score of vengeance was commenced. The kin and 
friends of Sir Jocelyn could no more forgive and 
forget his death than Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe 
could forgive the burning of his house and the 
murther of his wife ; every man that had fallen in 
the field left some behind him who were sure to 
call for vengeance. 



( 44 ) 



111. 



Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe and the other 
knights whose houses had been destroyed by the 
so sudden onset of their enemies, regained posses- 
sion of their lands ; and, in other parts of the king- 
dom, Stephen, by force of arms, or by treaty, re- 
covered nearly all the castles which had been taken 
from him. Merciful was the ^oul of King Ste- 
phen, even as that of our lord abbat ; for, although 
he lopped off the hands of some few of the mean 
sort, he took not the life of one lord or knight, 
but, upon submission made, did pardon them all 
their late rebellion. The empress's illegitimate 
half-brother, Robert, Earl of Gloucester, fled be- 
yond sea ; and when he was safe in Anjou, he sent 
his defiance to Stephen, wherein he renounced his 
homage, and called the king usurper. But before 
he fled out of England, Earl Robert had made a 
great league with many of our barons, and had 
induced the Scottish king to engage to invade our 
land with all the forces he could collect. King 
Stephen was again triumphant over his many foes ; 
he took castle after castle from the English barons, 
and rarely began a siege which did not end pros- 
perously. When the Scots, and Gallowegians, 
and Highlanders, and men of the Isles, burst into 
Northumberland and advanced into Yorkshire, 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 45 

Stephen was not there ; but the army that was 
collected for him by Thurstan, my lord arch- 
bishop of York, and that was commanded for him 
in the field by Ranulph, my lord bishop of Dur- 
ham, and by William Peveril and Walter Espee 
of Nottinghamshire, and Gilbert de Lacy and his 
brother Walter de Lacy of Yorkshire, gained a 
glorious and most complete victory over the Scot- 
tish barbarians at Northallerton in the great battle 
of the Standard, slaying twelve thousand of them. 
The country, and the poor people of it, suffered 
much during these sieges, and intestine wars, and 
foreign invasions ; but they came not near to 
Reading Abbey, and King Stephen was everywhere 
successful, until, in an evil hour for him and for 
all of us, he did violence to the church in order to 
satisfy the rapacity of his ungodly men of war. 
For ye must know that King Stephen, in order to 
gain the affections of the lay baronage, had given 
away so many lands and so much money, that he 
had now nought left to give, and still those barons 
cried "Give! give! or we will declare for the 
empress." " I see a flaw in your title, therefore give 
me two more castles," said one great lord. " I see 
two flaws, therefore give me four more castles that 
I may support your right," said another great lord. 
" I fought for thee at Northallerton, and therefore 
must have some domain for my guerdon," said 
another. But castles, domains, all had been given 
away already ; there remained not of the crown 
lands enough to keep the king and his household, 
and as for the treasury, it had long been empty. 
Seeing that Stephen was like a spunge that had 
been squeezed, and that nothing was to be gotten 
except by war and change of government, sundry 



46 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

of these great lords withdrew to the strongest of 
their castles, and renewed their correspondence 
with the Earl of Gloucester. In these great straits, 
and while Stephen was holding his court in Oxen- 
ford, threatened by foreign invasion, and not 
knowing how to distinguish his friends from his 
foes, he was advised by the worst of his enemies to 
lay his hands upon the property of churchmen. 
The most potent and wealthy churchman of that 
day was old Roger, bishop of Sarum, who had been 
justiciary and treasurer to Henry Beauclerc, and 
who had for a season filled the same offices under 
Stephen ; and next to the Bishop of Winchester, 
Stephen's own brother, no man had done more than 
this Bishop Roger to bar the claim of the empress, 
and secure the crown for the king. Moreover, this 
great Bishop of Sarum had two episcopal nephews 
almost as great as himself; the first of them being 
Alexander, bishop of Lincoln ; the second, Nigel, 
bishop of Ely. All three had been great builders 
of castles, and men of a bold and martial humour. 
I find not in the canons or in the fathers that 
bishops ought to make their houses places of arms; 
but it is to be remembered King Stephen, to please 
the baronage, had, at the commencement of his 
reign, given every baron permission to fortify his 
old castle or castles, and to build new ones ; nor is 
it to be forgotten that in the midst of so many 
places of arms, the simple unfortified manor-house 
of a bishop could never have been a safe abiding 
place, or have afforded any protection to the serfs 
who cultivated the soil, and the rest of my lord 
bishop's people. If Bishop Roger and his nephews 
did build some castles for the defence of their 
manors and the people upon them, and did expend 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 47 

much money in temporalities, they did also raise 
splendid edifices to the glory of God. Witness 
the great church at Sarum, which Bishop Roger 
rebuilt after it had been injured by fire and by 
tempest — witness the beautiful works done at Lin- 
coln by Bishop Alexander, who nearly rebuilt the 
whole of that cathedral ; and at Ely, by Bishop 
Nigel. And these three great prelates did make 
noble use of their wealth, in bringing over from 
foreign parts good builders and artisans, and men 
of letters and doctrine, to improve and teach in 
their several ways the people of this island ; and if 
Bishop Nigel was somewhat overmuch given to 
hunting and hawking, and spent much time, as well 
as much money, upon his falcons and falconers, 
doubtlessly it was because the climate of Ely is 
cold and damp, and requireth much exercise of the 
body for the conservation of health, and because the 
circumjacent fen country doth incredibly and most 
temptingly abound with wild-fowl proper for the 
hawk to fly at.- But to the propositus. King Ste- 
phen, being minded to plunder these three great 
prelates, did summon them all three to his court at 
Oxenford, where many ravenous lay lords and some 
foreign lords had previously assembled. The two 
nephews, apprehending no mischief, and being 
young men and active, went willingly enough ; 
but it was otherwise with the uncle, who was now 
a very old man. Bishop Roger had lost his relish 
for courts, and seemingly had some presentiment ; 
for, as he started on his journey, he was heard to 
say, " By my Ladie St. Mary, I know not where- 
fore, but my heart is heavy ; but this I do know 
for a surety, that I shall be of much the same ser- 
vice at court as a fool in battle." At Oxenford 



48 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

the three bishops were received with a great show 
of courtesy, as men who had done notable service 
to the king, and as men whom the king delighted 
to honour ; but they had not been long in the 
town when a fierce quarrel arose about quarters 
and purveyance between the retainers of Bishop 
Roger and the followers of that outlandish man 
the Earl of Brittany. The aged prelate would 
have stilled this tumult, but the Bretons, who had 
been purposely set on by those about the king, 
would not desist, and swords being drawn on both 
sides, the affray did not end until many men of the 
commoner sort were wounded, and one knight was 
slain. And hereupon it was wickedly given out 
that the bishops' people had begun the affray, and 
that the three bishops had set them on to break the 
king's peace, and murther his guests within the 
precincts of his royal court. Bishop Roger, the 
uncle, was seized in the king's own hall, and Alex- 
ander, the bishop of Lincoln, at his lodgings in the 
town ; but Bishop Nigel, who had taken up his 
quarters in a house outside the town, getting to 
horse, galloped across the country, and threw him- 
self into the castle of Devizes, the strongest of all 
his uncle's strongholds. And it was thought that 
the Bishop of Ely would not have been able to do 
this, and to distance his pursuers by leaping hedge 
and ditch, if he had not providentially practised 
hunting and hawking in his easy days. Bishop 
Roger, and his less fortunate nephew Alexander, 
bishop of Lincoln, were confined in separate dun- 
geons at Oxenford. They were severally told that 
the king held them as traitors, and that the price 
of their liberation would be surrender unto Stephen 
of all their castles and manors, with whatsoever 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 49 

treasure they contained ; and those who delivered 
the message chuckled at it, seeing that they hoped 
to have a share in the great spoil. At first Bishop 
Roger and Bishop Alexander did manfully refuse 
to give up anything, but bishops in dungeons and 
in chains are weak, and kings be sometimes very 
strong ; and after they had been menaced with 
torture and death, the two prelates put their names 
and seals to an act of surrender and renunciation, 
and the castles which Roger had built at Malms- 
bury and Sherborne, and that which he had en- 
larged and strengthened at Sarum, and the mag- 
nificent castle which Bishop Alexander had built 
at Newark, together with other places of strength, 
were taken possession of by the king's people, in 
virtue of the orders of the two bishops to their own 
people. But the alert, hard-riding, and warlike 
Bishop of Ely would not give up the castle of 
Devizes, into which he had thrown himself on 
his escape from Oxenford ; and, counting on the 
strength of his uncle's best fortress, and on the affec- 
tion the garrison and the people of the neighbour- 
ing country bore to his family, Nigel did defy the 
power of King Stephen. Our unhappy ill-advised 
king, whom I have so often seen, and with whom 
I have so often spoken in this our house at Reading, 
had not the head to conceive, nor the heart to 
execute, the foul trick which followed. No ! it 
was all the contriving and the doing of some of 
his ill-advisers, of the Earl of Brittany, or Sir 
Alberic de Vere, or some other or others of those 
children of perdition. Fasting is commendable at 
some seasons, but starvation is horrible at ail. If a 
man starve himself, he is guilty of the worst and 
most unnatural species of suicide ; and if a man 



50 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

starve another, certes he is guilty of the cruellest 
of murthers. That which impresses on my mind 
the belief that the aforesaid Sir Alberic de Yere 
was deep in this guilt, are the facts of which I 
have had assurance ; to wit, that Sir Alberic never 
afterwards gave a feast in his own castle, without 
seeing the apparitions of two ghastly, pale, starving 
bishops take their stand opposite to him, and knit 
their brows, and wave their right hands, as if they 
were pronouncing a curse each time his plate was 
laid before him or his wine-cup filled ; and that 
the said Sir Alberic did die at the last of angina, 
which closed up his throat and allowed no food to 
pass. Bethink ye whether the knight did not then 
think of Bishop Roger and his episcopal nephew ! 
But the procedure to force the Bishop of Ely to 
give up the strong castle of Devizes was this : — 
Bishop Roger and his nephew, the Bishop of Lin- 
coln, were loaded in their dungeons with more 
chains, and orders were given that they should be 
kept without food until the castle was delivered up 
to King Stephen. When Bishop Nigel was told 
of this intent he could not believe it, nor was it 
easy, even in those wicked days, for any man to 
conceive the world wicked enough to starve two 
prelates. " I will keep mine uncle's castle for 
him," said Bishop Nigel, " for they dare not do 
the thing they speak of." But, alack ! his lordship 
was soon convinced to the contrary ; for Bishop 
Roger himself, already pale and emaciated, was 
carried to Devizes, and made to state his own case 
in front of his own castle. And the old man im- 
plored his nephew to surrender, and so save the life 
of his uncle and that of his brother : and then 
Bishop Nigel gave up that great fortress, and there- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 51 

upon Bishop Roger and Bishop Alexander were 
allowed to have food, after they had been three days 
and three nights in a fearful fast. Before long all 
three of the bishops were set at liberty, but they 
had been plundered of nearly all they possessed. 
The evil advisers of King Stephen got most of the 
spoil. The robbery did not even a momentary 
good to the king, and terrible was the penalty he 
was made to pay for it. The whole body of the 
dignified clergy turned against him ; and even his 
own brother, Henry, bishop of Winchester, who 
was now the Pope's legatus for all England, did 
join the other bishops in charging Stephen with 
sacrilege. It was his own brother, the legatus, 
who summoned the king to appear before a synod 
of bishops at Winchester ; and what is brotherly 
love when weighed in the balance with the duty 
of every churchman to the church ? King Ste- 
phen would not attend personaliter, but he sent 
unto Winchester that Sir Alberic de Yere of whom 
I have spoken ; and Sir Alberic went into the hall 
of synod with a great company of armed knights, 
and did there much misuse the prelates of the land, 
and did refuse, in Stephen's name, to make restitu- 
tion to Bishop Roger and his two nephews of that 
of which they had been despoiled ; and when he 
had done these things, Sir Alberic made appeal to 
the pope and dissolved the council, the wicked 
knights with him drawing their swords to enforce 
obedience. The bishops separated for that present, 
but every one of them saw that madness and much 
wickedness had prepared the downfall of King 
Stephen. Bishop Roger died of old age, and grief 
and indignation, and of the fatal effects of that 
dread fast ; and while he was dying, the plate and 



52 A X.EGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

money which he had saved from the king's rapacity, 
which he had devoted to the completion of his 
glorious church at Sarum, and which he had layed 
for safety upon the high altar, were seized and 
carried off by some who cared not for the guilt of 
sacrilege, and who were so blind that they could 
not see in what such crimes must end. Forty thou- 
sand marks, by our Ladie, was the value of that 
which was stolen from the shadow of the Holy of 
Holies ! 

Now some of the baronage and clergy did send 
messengers into Anjou to invite the Empress Ma- 
tilda into England, and to give her assurance good 
that they would place her upon the throne of her 
late father. And the ex-empress, being a woman 
of a high spirit, did presently come over with her 
half-brother the Earl of Gloucester, and one hun- 
dred and forty knights ; and the two nephews of 
the late Bishop Roger and many of the optimates 
did renounce their allegiance to King Stephen and 
join her standard. Bishop Nigel, who would have 
continued to hold the castle of Devizes if it had 
not been for that fearful fast, went into the Isle of 
Ely, his own diocese, and there amidst the bogs 
and fens, and on the very spot where Hereward the 
Lord of Brunn had withstood William the Con- 
queror, he raised a great rampart and collected a 
great force against Stephen. In other parts our 
bishops were seen mounted on war-horses, clad in 
armour, and directing in the battle or the siege : 
and many and bloody were the battles which were 
fought during two years, and until King Stephen 
was surprised and defeated in the great battle 
of Lincoln, and taken prisoner by the Earl of 
Gloucester, the half-brother of the empress. Ste- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 53 

phen was now thrown into a dungeon in Bristowe 
Castle, and his brother the Bishop of Winchester 
and legatus acknowledged the right and title of 
the empress, and led her in triumph to his cathe- 
dral church at Winchester, and there blessed all 
who should be obedient to her, and cursed all who 
should refuse to submit to her authority. And 
this being done, Stephen's brother, the bishop and 
legate aforesaid, did convene an assembly of 
churchmen to ratify her accession. At this synod 
the said legate bore testimony against his brother, 
and said that God had pronounced judgment 
against him ; and the great churchmen, to whom 
it chiefly belongs to elect kings and ordain them, 
did elect Matilda to till the place which Stephen's 
demerits had vacated. Yet some of the clergy 
there were who did not think that they could be 
so easily discharged of the oaths they had taken 
unto Stephen, or move so far in this matter with- 
out a direct command from our lord the pope, and 
many lords there were, as well of the laity as of the 
clergy, who did not like Matilda the better for 
knowing more of her. But not one felt more un- 
happy at these changes than our good lord abbat, 
who came back from the last meeting of the clergy 
at Winchester well nigh broken-hearted ; for, albeit 
he lamented his errors, he had much affection for 
King Stephen and great reverence to the obliga- 
tions of an oath, and very earnestly. desired peace 
and happiness to the country. 

Also was he and all of us of the house at Heading 
and all devout and considerate men in the land, much 
consternated by great signs in the heavens : for on 
the twenty-first of the kalends of March in the year 
of our redemption eleven hundred and forty, while 

D 



54 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

we were sitting at dinner, there was so great an 
eclipse of the sun that we could not see to eat our 
meat, and were forced to light candles, and when 
lights were brought in our appetites were gone be- 
cause of our great fear ; and when we went out to 
gaze at the obscured sun and blackened heavens 
we did plainly see divers stars twinkling near the 
sun. And these sad sights were seen all over the 
land, making men believe, while they lasted, that 
chaos was come again, and that this day was to be 
the day of judgment. Abbat Edward did inter- 
pret these things as omens of our future woe. 

" I do foresee," said he, " that infinite woe will 
arise out of these our distractions, and I can plainly 
see with only half of an eye that too many of our 
magnates be looking to nothing but their own 
worldly advantage. With this classis of men 
'twill be down with Stephen and up with Matilda 
to-day, and down with Matilda and up with Ste- 
phen to-morrow ; just as they hope to gain by the 
change. They will all find in the end that they 
have miscalculated, but that will not heal the 
wounds that will have been inflicted on the country 
through their selfish unsteadiness, and lack of prin- 
ciple, and oath-breaking. The ex-empress hath 
brought a pestilent set of hungry foreigners over 
with her ; and every one of them is looking for 
some great estate or bishopric or abbey; others 
will follow, and they will have no bowels of com- 
passion for the people of this land. 'Tis true King 
Stephen hath done much amiss or hath allowed 
evil things to be done in his name, but Matilda 
will do worse, and will have less power than he to 
prevent the rapacity and bloodthirstiness of others J 
Steel-clad barons and knights will not yield obe- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 55 

dience to the distaff. Even the church will be 
divided. St. John and St. James to our aid ! 
but my heart trembles for this house, and for the 
poor townfolk of Reading, and the freemen and 
the serfs who have so long lived in peace upon our 
manors ; I am an old man — this journey to Win- 
chester hath added the weight of ten more years — 
I shall not live to see an end to these troubles 
which have already lasted four years. Death will 
relieve me from witnessing the worst ; but when I 
am gone hence, oh my brethren and children, put 
your faith in heaven, and remember that the hon- 
estest policy is aye the best, and meditate night 
and day, and labour hard, in order to lessen the suf- 
ferings of our poor vassals and dependants." 

Grieves me to say that some of our house who 
made many solemn protestations now, did not in 
aftertime do that which they ought to have done. 

Affairs were in this state, and the flames of civil 
war were raging all round us, and the health of 
our good lord abbat was daily breaking more and 
more, when the Empress Matilda passed through 
Reading without stopping at our abbey to say an 
orison at her father's grave, being on her way to 
"Westminster, there to be crowned and anointed by 
those who had crowned King Stephen only six years 
ago. But the citizens of London, who were very 
bold and powerful, loved Stephen more than Ma- 
tilda, and before the coronation dresses could be got 
ready they rose upon her and drove her from the 
city, flying on horseback and at first almost alone, 
as she did. This time the daughter of the Beau- 
clerc found it opportune to come to our abbe} r , for 
she wanted food, lodging, and raiment, and knew 
not where else to procure them. A messenger on 

d2 



56 " A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

a foundered horse announced that she was coming, 
and by the time the man had put his beast into our 
lord abbat's stable, a great cloud of dust was seen 
rolling on the road beyond the Kennet from the 
eastward. " Medea fert tristes succos — she is com- 
ing, and will bring poisons with her ! She cometh 
in a whirlwind," said our good lord abbat, " and 
albeit she is her father's daughter — the lawfully, 
begotten daughter of the founder of this house, 
(though some men do say the contrary,) it grieves 
me that she cometh at all. Last year, and at this 
same season of the year, we did lodge and enter- 
tain King Stephen, and prayed God to bless him ; 
and now must I feast this wandering woman and 
cry God save Queen Matilda? The unlettered 
and rustical people be slow of comprehension, yet 
will they not have their hearts turned from us by 
seeing these rapid shiftings and changings ? And 
so soon as the commoner sort lose their faith or 
belief in the principles of their betters, crime and 
havoc will have it all their own way. This people 
— this already mixed people of Saxons and Nor- 
mans — will go backwards into blood, and there 
will be war between cottage and cottage as well as 
between castle and castle !" 

The empress- queen arrived at our gates, and 
with a numerous attendance ; for some had fol- 
lowed by getting stealthily out of London, and 
some had joined her on the road. Sooth to say 
she was an imperious, and despotical, and loud- 
voiced, manlike woman, and of a very imposing 
presence. Maugre her hasty flight she had a coro- 
net of gold on her head, and a jewel like a star 
on her breast, and her garments were of purple 
and gold. A foreign lord, with a truculent coun 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 57 

tenance, bore a naked sword before her, and an- 
other knight, with a visage no less stern, carried 
a jewelled sceptre. 

" 'Tis mine own father's house/' said she as she 
came within our gates, " 'tis the gift and doing of 
mine own father, of blessed memory, and much, 
oh monks ! did you wrong him and me by enter- 
taining within these walls the foul usurper Ste- 
phen. The usurper is rotting in the nethermost 
dungeon of Bristowe Castle, and there let him die'; 
but, oh abbat, lead me to my dear father's tomb, 
that I may say a prayer for the good of his soul ; 
and see in the coining place what money thou hast 
in hand, for much do I lack money and must for 
the nonce be a borrower ! Bid thy people make 
ready a banquet in the hall, for we be all fasting 
and right hungry ; and send into the township and 
call forth each man that hath a horse and a sword, 
in order that he may follow us to Oxenford, and 
help to be our guard upon the way. Do these few 
things, oh abbat, and I will yet hold thee in good 
esteem. The land rings with thy great wealth 
and power. By Notre Dame of Anjou ! 'tis a 
goodly house, and the walls be strong, and the 
ditch round about broad and deep, — by the holy 
visage of St. Luke ! I will not hence to-night 
though all the rebel citizens of London, that do 
swarm like bees from their hives, should follow me 
so far." 

Our good lord abbat could do little more "than 
bow and cross himself, and our prior of the bellicose 
humour, who partook in our abbat's affection for 
King Stephen, reddened in the face and turned 
aside his face and grinded his teeth, and muttered 
down his own throat, " Beshrew the distaff I The 



58 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Beauclerc, her sire, was more courteous unto 
clerks !" 

Our sub-prior, being of a more supple nature, 
and being, moreover, not without his hopes of 
being nominated to the abbatial dignity so soon as 
our lord abbat should be laid under the chancel of 
the abbey church, kneeled before the empress- 
queen, and then formed some of the monks in pro- 
cessionale, and began lead the way to the sepulchre 
of Henricus Primus. But this roused the abbat 
and threw the thoughts of our prior into another 
channel, and the lord abbat said in a grim and 
loud whisper unto the sub-prior, " I am chief here, 
and none must move without my bidding ;" and 
the prior said without any essay at a whisper, 
c< Oh, sub, seek not to climb above me ! " 

The proud woman reddened and said, "If ye 
would honour me, oh monks, as your queen, make 
haste to do it ! An ye will not, I can get me in 
without your ceremonies. No time have I to 
lose, and money and aid must be forthcoming !" 

Then up spake the lord abbat Edward, and said 
in a loud voice, " Oh dread ladie, when that king 
of peace and lion of justice, 12 ex pads et leo jus- 
tifies, did found this house, he did give us his 
royal charter, wherein it is said, ( Let no person, 
great or small, whether by violence or as a due 
custom, exact anything or take anything from the 
persons, lands, or possessions whatsoever belonging 
unto the monastery of Reading ; nor levy any 
money, nor ask any tax for the building of bridges 
or castles, for carriages or for horses for car- 
rying ; nor lay any custom or subsidy, whether 
for ship-money or tribute-money or for presents; 
nor '" 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 59 

f* Oh abbat of the close fiat," said Matilda, " I 
only want to borrow." 

" But we may not lend without full consent of 
all our chapter monks in chapter assembled," quoth 
the prior. 

" And the foundation charter of Henricus Pri- 
mus," said our abbat, " recommends all the suc- 
cessors of the said royal founder to observe the 
charter as they wish for the divine favour and pre- 
servation, and pronounces a malediction upon any 
one that shall infringe or diminish his donations. 
Dread ladie, thou art the Beauclerc's daughter : 
the curse of a father is hard to bear !" 

There was some whispering and sign-making 
among her followers ; but the imperious woman said 
not a word : she only stretched out her right hand 
and pointed forward, into the interior of our abbey. 

We now formed in more proper order and went 
through the church to the Beauclerc's grave, on 
the broad slab of which there burned unceasing 
lamps, and sweet incense renewed every hour, and 
at the edge of which there was ever some brother 
of the house telling his beads and praying for the 
defunct king, the founder of the house. Dim was 
the spot, for death is darkness, and too much light 
suits ill with the decaying flesh and bones of mortal 
man, be he king or plough-hind ; yet, as the em- 
press-queen entered, our acolytes touched the tips 
of three hundred and sixty-five tapers — sweet 
smelling tapers made of the wax brought from 
Gascony and Spain and Italie — and in an instant 
that dim sepulchral place was flooded with light, 
the converging rays meeting and shining brightest 
upon the black slab and the graven epitaph which 
began with the proud titles of the Beauclerc king, 



60 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and which ended with that passage from holy writ 
which saith that all is vanity here below. 

Matilda knelt and put her lips to that black slab 
(which she safely might do, for it was kept clear 
of all dirt and dust, it being the sole occupation 
of one of the lay brothers of our house to rub it 
every day and keep it clean), and she said an ori- 
son, of the shortest, and made some show of shed- 
ding tears ; but then she quickly rose, and would 
have gone forth from the vault or cappella. But 
the lord abbat was not minded that the first visit 
paid by his daughter to the tomb of her father 
should pass off with so little ceremony and devo- 
tion ; and, he himself taking the lead with his 
deep solemn voice, the Officium de Functorum r 
or Service for the Dead, was recited and chanted* 
The empress-queen was somewhat awed and moved, 
and there seemed to be penitential tears in her 
eyes as we chaunted " Beati Mortui qui in Domino 
moriuntur ;" but at the last requiem " .iEternam" 
she flung away from the place and began to talk 
with a loud shrill voice of worldly affairs and of 
battles and sieges — for the royal-born woman had 
the heart of a man and warrior, and her grand- 
father the great Conqueror was not more ambitious 
or avid of dominion than she. 

When we had well feasted Matilda and those 
who followed her in the abbat's apartment, we 
hoped she would be gone, for it was a long and 
fine clay of June, well nigh upon the feast of St. 
John, and she well might have ridden half way to 
Oxenforcl before nightfall ; but she soon gave the 
abbat to understand that she had no intention of 
going so soon. Without blushing she did ask how 
and where we monks could lodge her and her 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 61 

women for the night, telling us that she could not 
think of sleeping in the town, seeing that it was 
but poorly defended by walls and bulwarks. The 
abbat looked at the prior, and all the fathers looked 
at one another with astonishment, but the ungodly 
waiting-women, who came all from Anjou and 
other foreign parts, only smiled and simpered as 
they gazed at one another and observed our ex- 
ceeding great confusion. 

" In truth, royal dame," said our lord abbat, 
" it is against the rule of our order to lodge fe- 
males within our walls." 

" But I am your queen, oh abbat," said Matilda, 
" and this is a royal abbey, and my sire founded it 
and endowed it ! Have I not, as my father's 
daughter and lawful sovereign of this realm, the 
right to an exemption from the severity of your 
ordinances ?" 

" Ladie," quoth the abbat, u I wit not that you 
have such right, or that the rule of St. Benedict is 
in any case to be set aside." 

" But it hath been set aside," said Matilda, 
" and queens and their honourable damsels have 
slept in royal abbeys before now." 

" That," quoth the abbat, " was before the 
Norman conquest, when, through the indolence, 
carelessness, and gluttony of the Saxon monks, 
the statutes of our order were generally ill- 
observed." 

" But I tell thee, oh stubborn monk^ that I, the 
empress-queen, that I, thy liege ladie Matilda, 
have slept and sojourned in half the abbeys and 
priories of England !" 

" 'Tis because of these civil wars which have 
so long raged to the destruction of all discipline 

- d3 



62 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and order, and to the utter undoing of this poor 
people of England ! I, by the grace of God, 
abbat of Reading, would not shape my conduct 
after the pattern of some abbats and priors that be 
in this land, or willingly allow that which they 
perchance may have permitted without protest, 
and to the spiritual dishonour of their houses." 

Here the eyes of the empress-queen flashed fire, 
and wrathful and scornful was the voice with 
which she said unto our good lord abbat, in pre- 
sence of most of the community-, " Shaveling, I 
am here, and will here tarry so long as it suits my 
occasions ! I believe thy traitorous affection for 
my false cousin Stephen hath more to do with 
thine obstinacy than any reverence thou bearest to 
the rules of thine order. But, monk, 'tis too late ! 
thou shouldest have kept thy gates closed ! I and 
my maidens are within thy house, and these my 
faithful knights will see thee and thy brethren 
slain between the horns of the altar rather than 
see the Queen of England thrust out like a vagrant 
beggar from the abbey her own father founded !" 

As the empress -queen said these words the 
knights knit their brows and made a rattling with 
their swords. This did much terrify the major 
part of our community, and I, Felix, being then 
of a timorous nature, and a great lover of peace, 
as became my profession, did creep towards the 
door of the hall. But our prior spoke out with a 
right manful voice against the insults put upon 
our good abbat, telling the empress-queen to her 
face that respect and reverence were due to the 
church even from the greatest of princes ; that her 
father, of renowned and happy memory, would not 
so have treated the humblest servant of the church ; 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 63 

and that if this unseemly business should be put to 
the issue of arms — if swords should be drawn over 
her royal father's grave — it might peradventure 
happen that the armed retainers of the abbey 
would prove as good men as these outlandish 
knights, and that the fathers and brothers of the 
house would fight for their lives, as other] servants 
of the church had ofttimes been constrained to do 
in these turbulent, lawless, ungodly days.'* 

At this discourse of our bellicose prior the 
empress-queen turned pale and her lip quivered, 
though more through wrath than fear, as it seemed 
to me ; but her knights left off noising with their 
swords ; and one of them, a native knight, spoke 
words of gentleness and accommodation, and put 
it as an entreaty rather than as a command, that 
the queen should be allowed to infringe our rules 
for only one night. 

" My conscience doth forbid it," said our lord 
abbat, " for it may be made a precedent, to the 
great injury and decay of our discipline. There- 
fore do I solemnly enter my protest against it. 
But as I would not see this holy house denied by 
strife and blood, nor attempt a forcible expulsion, 
I will quit mine apartments." And so saying, the 
lord abbat withdrew, and was followed by all of 
us. The queen slept in the abbat's bed ; her 
maidens on the rushes, which were carried into 
that chamber from the abbat's hall ; and the 
knights and men-at-arms slept in the Aula Magna. 
And, as our good abbat had foreseen, this evil 
practice was taken as a precedent, in such sort that 
empresses and queens, and other great princesses, 
have in these later times been often lodged in 



64 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Benedictine and in other houses ; yet, wherever 
the abbats and monks entertain a proper sense of 
their duty, they lodge these visitors in the lord 
abbat's house, apart from the religious com- 
munity. 

But before sleeping, the empress-queen did many 
things, for it still wanted some hours of the Ave 
Maria, and many were the stormy thoughts that 
were working in her brain. Two of her knights 
we allowed to go out of the house by the postern- 
gate, but farther ingress we granted to none ; and 
not only did our armed retainers keep watch for 
us, but our monks, under the vigilant eye of the 
prior, did also keep watch and ward all through 
that evening and night, for we feared some ex- 
treme mischief; and it would not have failed to 
happen if Matilda had been enabled to get her 
partisans in greater force within the house. In 
truth, not many of our community knew that 
night what sleep was. The materials for an 
abundant supper were furnished to the empress- 
queen and her people ; and some of these last 
were singing ungodly songs in the abbat's great 
hall when our church-bell told the midnight hour ; 
yea, there was a noise of singing, and a running to 
and fro, and a squealing of womanly voices long 
after that, to the great sorrow and shame of the 
fathers of our house. I, Felix, albeit only a 
novice, was of those who slept not. And I saw a 
great sight. Watching in the eastern turret, I did 
see a fiery meteor, hirsute like a comet, but not so 
big, shoot up from the marshes on the other side 
of the Kennet, not far from the back of our abbey ; 
and this meteor, as it passed over our house, did 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 65 

divide itself into three several parts, and these did 
rush away to the westward as quick as lightning, 
and there drop and disappear. Before the night 
came again I was made to understand what these 
things meant. 



( 66 ) 



IV. 



From all ungodly guests libera nos I Although 
they had feasted so late at night, the people of the 
empress did make an early call for a matutinal re- 
fection ; and our good chamberlain and coquinarius 
and cellarius were made to bestir themselves by 
times, and sundry of our lay brothers and servitors, 
to the great endangering of their souls, were made 
to run with viands and drink into our lord abbat's 
hall, and there wait upon the daughter of the 
Beauclerc and her foreign black-eyed damsels, who 
did shoot love-looks at them and discompose their 
monastic sobriety and gravity by laying their hands 
upon their sleeves and twitching their hoods for 
this thing and that (for the young Jezebels spoke 
no English), and by singing snatches of love songs 
at them, even as the false syrens of old did unto 
the wise Ulysses. Certes, the founder of our order, 
the blessed Benedict, did know what he was a-doing 
when he condemned and prohibited the resort of 
women to our houses and their in-dwelling with 
monks. Monks are mortal, and mortal flesh is 
weak : et ne nos inducas in tentationem. 

It was still an early hour, not much more than 
half way between prima and tertia, when more 
troubles came upon us. The two knights who had 
been sent forth by the daughter of the Beauclerc 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 67 

to make an espial into the condition of the country, 
and to summon her friends unto her, returned to 
our gate with a large company of knights and men- 
at-arms, and demanded to be readmitted. Our 
good abbat, calling together the fathers of the house, 
held counsel with them ; and it was agreed that to 
admit so great a company of men of war would be 
perilous to our community ; and even our bellicose 
prior did opine that our people would be too few to 
protect the abbey if these men without should be 
joined to those the empress had within. It was 
our prior who addressed that great company from 
the porter's window over the gateway, telling them 
that the two knights who had come from London 
with the empress might be readmitted, but that our 
doors would not be unbarred even unto them unless 
the rest of that armed host went to a distance into 
the King's Mead. Hereat there arose a loud cla- 
mour from those knights and men-at-arms, with 
great reproaches and threats. Yea, one of those 
knights, Sir Richard a Chambre, who was in after 
time known for a most faithless man, and a variable, 
changing sides as often as the moon doth change 
her face, did call our lord abbat apostate monk 
and traitor, and did threaten our good house with 
storm and spoliation. The major part of us had 
gathered in front of the house to see and hear what 
was passing ; but, alack ! we were soon made to run 
towards the back of the abbey, for while Sir 
Richard a Chambre was discoursing in this un- 
seemly strain, and shaking his mailed fist at the 
iron bars through which he could scantly see the 
tip of our prior's nose, a knight on foot, who wore 
black mail and a black plume in his casque, and who 
never raised his visor and scarce spoke word after 



68 A LEGEND OP READING ABBEY. 

these few, came running round the eastern angle 
of the abbey walls, shouting " ? Tis open ! 'tis ours ! 
Win in, in the name of Matilda!" The voice that 
said these few words seemed to not a few of us to 
have been heard before, but we had no time to 
think of that. The armed host set up a shout, and 
ran round for our postern gate, which openeth upon 
the Kennet, and we all began to run for the same, 
our lord abbat wringing his hands, and saying 
" The postern ! the postern ! some traitor hath 
betrayed us !" 

Now our postern was secured by two great locks 
of rare strength and ingenuity of workmanship, 
and the keys thereof were not intrusted to the 
portarius, but were always kept by the sub-prior, 
and without these keys there was no undoing the 
door either from within or from without. As he 
ran from the great gateway, I heard our prior say 
in an angry voice unto the sub-prior, " Brother 
Hildebrand, how is this ? Where be the keys ?" 
And I heard the sub-prior make response, " On 
my soul, I know not how it is, but verily the keys 
I did leave under the pallet in my cell/' 

When we came into the paved quadrangle, we 
found some of our retainers hastily putting on their 
armour ; but when we came into the garden, we 
found it thronged with men already armed, and we 
saw the postern wide open and many more warriors 
rushing in through it : the evil men who had stayed 
with the queen, and who had so much abused our 
hospitality, had already joined the new comers, and 
the united and still increasing force was so great 
that we could not hope to expel them and save our 
house from robbery and profanation. Our very 
prior smDte his breast in despair. But our good 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 69 

abbat, though of a less bellicose humour, had no 
fear of the profane intruders, for he stood up in the 
midst of them and upbraided them roundly, and 
threatened to lay an interdict upon them all for the 
thing that they were doing. But anon the empress 
herself came forth with one that waved a flag over 
her head, and at sight hereof the sinful men set up 
a shouting and fell to a kissing, some the flag, 
w r hich was but a small and soiled thing, and some — 
on their knees — the hand of the Beauclere's daugh- 
ter ; and while this was passing, those foreign 
damsels came salting and skipping, and clapping 
their hands and talking Anjou French, into the 
garden. There was one of them attired in a short 
green kirtle that had the smallest and prettiest feet, 
and the largest and blackest eyes, and the longest 
and blackest eyelashes, and the laughingest face, 
that ever man did behold in these parts of the 
world ; and she danced near to me on those tiny 
pretty feet, and glanced at me such glances from 
those black eyes, that my heart thumped against 
my ribs ; but the saints gave me strength and pro- 
tection, and I pulled my hood over my eyes and 
fell to telling my beads, and thus, when others were 
backsliders, I, Felix the novice, was enabled to 
stand steadfast in my faith. 

The empress had taken no heed of our lord 
abbat, or of any of us ; but when she had done 
welcoming the knights that came to do her service, 
and, imprimis, to escort her on her way to Oxen- 
ford, she turned unto the abbat and said, " Monk, 
thou art too weak to cope with a queen, the 
daughter of a king, the widow of an emperor, and 
one from whom many kings will spring. But by 
thy perversity, which we think amounts to treason, 



70 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

thou hast incurred the penalty of deprivation ; and 
when we have time for such matters, or at the very 
next meeting of a synod of bishops and abbats, I 
will see that thou art both deprived and im- 
prisoned." 

" That synod," said our abbat very mildly, 
" will not sit so soon, and from any synod I can 
appeal to his holiness the Pope." 

" Fool !" quoth Matilda, with the ugliest curl 
of the lip I ever beheld ; " obstinate fool ! the 
Pope's legate is our well-beloved subject and friend 
the Bishop of Winchester." 

" See that you keep his allegiance ! He hath 
put you upon a throne, and can pull you down 
therefrom ! " So spake our prior, who could not 
stomach the irreverent treatment the Countess of 
Anjou put upon his superior, and who knew that 
Matilda had in various ways broken her compact 
with him, and done deeds highly displeasing to 
King Stephen's brother, the tough-hearted Bishop 
of Winchester. 

" Beshrew me !" quoth Matilda ; " but these 
Reading monks be proud of stomach and rebellious ! 
Sir Walleren of Mantes, drive them into their 
church, and see that they quit it not while we 
tarry here." 

" I will," said the foreign knight; "and also 
will I see that they do sing the Salve, Regina" 

And this Sir Walleren and other un knightly 
knights drew their swords and called up their re- 
tainers ; and before this ungodly host the abbat 
and prior and the monks were all compelled to 
retreat into the church, leaving the whole range of 
the abbey to those who had so unrighteously in- 
vaded it. But as soon as we were in the choir, 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 71 

instead of singing a Salve, Begina, we did chant 
In te, Domine, speravi. 

A strong guard was put at the church-door and 
in the cloisters ; but it was not needed, as we could 
oppose no resistance to those who were now rob- 
bing our house ; and as it had been determined 
therefore that all who had come into the church 
should remain, with psalmody and prayer, until 
these men of violence should take their departure 
from the abbey, or complete their wickedness by 
driving us from it. As they ransacked our house, 
as though it had been a castle taken by storm, and 
as they shouted and made such loud noises as 
soldiers use when a castle or a town hath been 
successfully stormed, we only chanted the louder 
in the choir. For full two hours did these par- 
tisans of Matilda ransack the abbey, witli none to 
say them nay. At the end of that time, when they 
had gotten all that they considered worth taking, 
that ill-visaged knight Sir Walleren of Mantes 
came to the church-door, and called forth the 
abbat and prior, saying that the queen w r ould 
speak with them before she went, and give them a 
lesson which they might remember. Though thrice 
summoned in the name of the queen, the heads of 
our house did not move, nor would they have gone 
forth at all if the fierce Sir Walleren aforesaid had 
not sent in a score of pikes to drive them, or prick 
them from their seats. Nay, even then, the prior 
would have run not unto the door, but unto the 
altar ; but the good abbat, fearing that God's 
house might be desecrated by blood, took the prior 
by the sleeve, and whispered a few soothing words 
to him, and so led him out into the cloisters ; and 
then all we who had been driven into the church 



72 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

followed the abbat and the prior, and went to the 
quadrangle, where was the queen on horseback, 
mounted on the lord abbat's own grey palfrey, 
which had been stolen from the stable, together 
with every horse and mule that our community 
possessed. It was a sad sight ; and the lord abbat's 
master of the horse and his palfrey -keeper were 
wringing their hands at it. Our good cattle, save 
and except the lord abbat's palfrey and a fine war- 
horse which had appertained to one of our knights y 
but which was now mounted by that silent knight 
in the black mail, who never raised his visor, were 
loaded with the spoils of our own house, to wit, the 
coined money taken out of our mint, provisions, 
corn, wine, raiment, and goodly furnishings. The 
masked knight had a plain shield, carried by his 
page, and no cognizance whereby he might be 
known : he held in his hand one of the queen's 
reins, and by his gestures, and his constant looking 
to the great gate of our house, which was now 
thrown wide open, he seemed very eager to be 
gone. As our lord abbat, with his hand still 
upon the prior's sleeve, came through the crowd 
and nigh to the space where Matilda sat upon his- 
own palfrey, she first frowned upon him and then 
laughed at him, and between laughing and frown- 
ing said — " Oh abbat that shalt not be abbat long,, 
thou hast comported thyself like a traitor and a 
very churl in stinting thy queen of that which she 
needed, in begrudging hospitality to these fair 
damsels, and in barring thy doors against these my 
gallant knights and faithful people. For this 
have we, for the present, relieved thy house of 
some of its superfluous stuff. It is not well that 
disloyal monks be so well supplied and furnished^ 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 73 

when a queen, and noble ladies, and high-born 
knights be unprovided and bare, and forced by- 
treasons foul to flee from place to place as if they 
were accursed Israelites. Light meals are fol- 
lowed by light digestion, and abstinence is favour- 
able to prayer and devotion. Yet have we taken 
nothing from ye, O monks, but what is rightfully 
ours, or was given ye by my father of thrice glo- 
rious memory." 

u Oh Empress, or Countess of Anjou, or Queen 
of England, if so must be, the deeds which have 
been done in this holy house, built and endowed 
by thy father for the expiation of his sins, will make 
the bones of thy father turn in his grave, and will 
bring down -a curse upon the heads of thee and thy 
party. Bethink thee, and repent while it is yet time! 
Thy father, the father of his people and the peace 
of his country, Pax patriae, gentisque suce Patei\ 
did for the good of his own soul found this abbey, 
and endow it with the town and manor of Reading, 
and with all the lands which had aforetime be- 
longed to the nunnery of Reading and the monas- 
teries of Cholsey and Leominster (which houses 
had been destroyed in our old wars), and he did 
make it one of the royal mitred abbeys, and did 
give the lord abbat privilege to coin his own 
money, by having a miut and mintmaster. Other 
donations did he make, and other privileges and 
honours did he confer upon our community. And 
hath not our lord the pope by a special bull con- 
firmed and sanctified this kingly grant, and taken 
our house, with all its possessions and appur- 
tenances, to wit, lands cultivated and uncultivated, 
its manors, meadows, woods, pastures, mills, 
fisheries, and all other, under the protection of the 



74 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

holy Roman see? And hath not his holiness 
decreed that none are to disturb our house, or to 
lay an impious hand on our possessions, or to 
keep, or diminish the same, or in any other way 
give us trouble ; but that all that we have and 
hold is to be kept under the government of the 
monks, and for the pious uses for which it was 
given ? And in the same bull hath not the pope 
blessed those who keep this commandment, and 
cursed those who in any way break it ? Unless 
thou makest restitution thou wilt be denied the 
viaticum on thy death-bed — et a sacratissimo cor- 
pore et sanguine Dei et Domini nostri aliena 
fiat." 

At these words spoken, the countess did some- 
what tremble on the palfrey, and turn pale ; but 
one of her wicked advisers from beyond sea said 
that she did but borrow, and would make resti- 
tution at the fitting time, and that we, being so 
rich, could well spare some of our substance. 

Our treasurer, who would not deign to speak to 
this foreign marauder, said to the countess, " Oh, 
ill-advised ladie, we be none so rich, and much is 
expected from us. By thy father's endowment 
full two hundred monks are to be kept for aye in 
this his royal abbey, and we be as yet scantiy more 
than one hundred and two score. Also do the 
good people that we have drawn to this township 
of Reading look to us for present employment and 
support ; and herein have we much laboured, for 
the good of the realm, and the happiness of the 
commoner sort. In the days of thy grandfather, 
the dread Conqueror of this kingdom, when the 
Domesday-book was made, Reading had only 
twenty-nine houses ; but now look abroad, and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 75 

see how new houses have risen, and men have 
increased under the shadow of our peaceful walls." 

u There will be woe and want among that 
industrious people/' said abbat Edward, " if thou 
carriest away from us this great spoil, and all the 
money that we have minted ! The curse of the 
poor, which is the next terriblest thing to the 
curse of God and holy church, will cling to thee, 
oh countess, or queen ! Look to it, oh Matilda ! 
I see the crown already dropping from thy head." 

" This is treason !'• said the silent knight with 
his visor down, in a voice which made all of us 
start, for it sounded like that of one who had lately 
been our fast friend. 

Matilda, rising in her saddle, with glaring eyes 
and reddened cheek, said, " And I, rebel monk, 
do see the mitre falling from thy head. Thou wilt 
not be abbot of Eeading this time next month." 

" Fiat voluntas^ let the will of God be done," 
replied our lord abbat. 

" And now," quoth the violent daughter of the 
Beauclerc, " let us ride on our way for Oxenford. 
Methinks we be now strong enough to defy all 
traitors on the road." And she struck with her 
riding-wand the grey palfrey, which it much 
grieved our abbat to lose, and followed by her 
knights and her leering and laughing foreign 
damsels, she rode out at our gate, and with a great 
host departed from Reading. 

When the evil-doers were all gone we made fast 
our doors, and proceeded to examine the condition 
of our house and its community. They had com- 
pletely emptied the buttery, the store-house, the 
granary, the wine-cellar ; they had so stripped the 
lord abbat's house and the lodging of the prior that 



76 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

there was nothing left in them save the tables and 
chairs, the mats and rushes ; they had broken open 
both treasury and sacristy, and had stolen thence 
all our most precious relics, and all our gold and 
silver vessels, and all our portable pictures and 
crucifixes ; they had not left us so much as a 
patera, a chalice, or an encensoire ; they had even 
laid their impious thievish hands upon the silver 
lamp which had been used to burn day and night 
at the head of the Beauclerc's tomb, and they had 
carried off with them the Agnus Dei and the 
jewelled cross which Henricus Primus had worn 
for many years of his life, and which, at his order, 
had been laid upon his tomb. That silver lamp 
had been sent to the abbey by Queen Adelise, the 
Beauclerc's second and surviving wife, who, on 
the first anniversary of the Beauclerc's death, gave 
us the manor of Aston in Hertfordshire, offering a 
pall upon the altar in confirmation of the grant ; 
and who likewise gave us the land of Reginald, 
the Forester, at Stanton-Harcourt, nigh unto Oxen- 
ford, and afterwards the patronage and revenues 
of the church of Stanton-Harcourt, to supply the 
cost of the silver lamp, which she herself did order 
should burn continually before the pix and the 
tomb of her late husband. Yet Matilda and her 
plundering band had carried off this precious 
cresset — and long did they prevent us getting any 
rent or revenues from the lands which Queen 
Adelise had granted us. Not the most recondite 
and secret part of our house had escaped their 
search. Much did we marvel at this, until, call- 
ing over the roll, we found that three members of 
our community did not answer to their names. 
The three missing were, two novices, to wit, young 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 77 

Urswick, the white-headed, from Pangbourne, and 
John Blount from Maple-Durham, and one full 
monk, to wit, Father Anselm, of Norman birth, 
who had but lately taken the vows, but who had 
been much employed by our treasurer in offices of 
trust. The two novices (may their souls be as- 
soiled !) had been wiled away by those young 
Jezebels, and had put on warlike harness, and had 
gone with Matilda to serve her as men-at-arms : 
Father Anselm, being a well-favoured man, had 
found favour in the sight of the Countess of 
Anjou, and had gone with her to be her mass- 
priest, and to aim at some vacant bishopric or 
abbey. Well had it been for us if he had never 
eome back to Reading. Heavy suspicions had 
fallen upon our sub-prior Hildebrand, touching 
the postern gate ; but it was ascertained upon in- 
quiry, that Urswick, the white-headed, who had 
been wont to wait upon the sub-prior, did, at the 
bidding of Matilda, or of one of her damsels, steal 
the keys and undo the door. 

Besides the three deserters from our own body, 
we found that divers of our armed retainers had 
taken service with the errant countess, and had 
gone away with her with their arms and horses ; 
and that even one of our knights, who did service 
for the lands of the abbey he held, had forgotten 
his bounden duty and his honour in a sudden fan- 
tastic affection for a pair of black eyes. 

We were bemoaning our losses, and our exceed- 
ing great calamity and disgrace, and wondering 
where we should get a dinner, when, some three 
hours after the departure of Matilda, and the host 
that followed her standard, another great body of 
horse and foot, bearing the banner of King Stephen, 

E 



78 A LEGEND OF HEADING ABBEY. 

marched towards our gates, demanding- meat and 
drink, and vowing, with many soldier-like profane 
oaths, that they would burn and destroy all such 
as were not for Stephen. The new alarm thus 
created was, however, but short, for some noble 
barons and knights, who had been riding in the? 
rear, came spurring up to the van, which was now: 
halting in the Falbury, and among these we saw,, 
with his vizor down, that right noble lord Sir 
Alain de Bohun, Lord of Caversham and the 
well-beloved nephew of our lord abbat,. whose 1 
sad heart was much rejoiced at his so sudden, ap* 
pearance. 

" Be it King Stephen or Queen Matilda," said 
the abbat, " let us throw open our gates to our 
well-beloved nephew, for he will not see harm 
done to us, and now, verily, we have nothing to* 
lose but lives not worth the taking." And the 
gates were thrown open, and Sir Alain was wel- 
comed and affectionately greeted by his uncle ; and 
after many expressions of astonishment and indig- 
nation at the wrongs which had been done us? 
Sir Alain and divers of the lords and knights with 
him retired for a space to the lord abbat's de- 
spoiled and naked apartment, with the lord 
abbat and our prior, and some other fathers. I 
was not of that council, being but a novice, nor 
can I say it that I ever learned in after times all 
that was said in it ; but I do know that when it 
was finished (and it lasted not long) the prior came 
forth with a very confident countenance, and told 
us all that the Bishop of Winchester, the pope's 
Legatus a latere, had changed sides, that Stephen 
of Blois was still King Stephen, and that we must 
sing a Te Deum laudamus for that same. And 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 79 

we all went forthwith into our church, and the 
barons and knights went in after us, and we ad- 
mitted as many as the church would hold of those 
men-at-arms, and bill-men and bow-men, that had 
halted in the Falbury with King Stephen's banner, 
and albeit we were hungry and faint, we sang the 
Te Deum for Stephen with sonorous voices. 

Sir Alain de Bohun, one of the very few lords 
of England that never changed sides during these 
nineteen years of revolutions and Avars, had fought 
bravely for King Stephen in the great battle at 
Lincoln, where other barons and knights had de- 
serted with all their forces to Matilda's illegitimate 
brother and commander the Earl of Gloucester ; 
and after Stephen had been taken prisoner (not 
until both his sword and battle-axe had been 
broken), Sir Alain had escaped from the field and 
had joined one of the many leagues of nobles who 
vowed never to submit to the distaff, or allow the 
Countess of Anjou to be Queen of England. In 
the five months which had passed since the battle 
of Lincoln, Sir Alain had fought in sundry other 
battles, and had given heart to many a knight, 
who, after the synod of "Winchester, had despaired 
of the cause of King Stephen. He had appeared 
w T ith a good body of horse, and the standard of 
Stephen, on the southern side of Thamesis, opposite 
the city of London, and his appearance had en- 
couraged the citizens to rise and drive out Ma- 
tilda. And the day before, appearing in the suburb 
of London, Sir Alain de Bohun had been at Guild- 
ford, and had there conferred with Stephen's 
queen, the good Maud, and also with Stephen's 
brother, the Bishop of Winchester, who did already 
repent him of that which he had done in synod. 

e2 



80 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

But that the bishop had met either Queen Maud 
or Sir Alain was for the present kept secret. 

The Lord of Caversham and his friends had 
crossed the river, and entered London city within 
an hour of Matilda's flight. Having toiled far 
that same day, the horses of the king's party were 
weary, and could not give pursuit ; but after short 
rest they followed the flying queen along the great 
road which leads to the westernmost parts of our 
island. Jesu Maria ! had they come unto Reading 
a few hours sooner, before the arrival of that bat- 
talia which the two knights Matilda had sent forth 
from our abbey had collected, the violent woman 
might have been made prisoner, and our house 
have been saved from plunder. But- now the 
horses of King Stephen's friends were again 
aweary, and though Sir Alain and the noble 
barons with him were stronger in foot soldiers, 
they were much weaker in horse than the host 
which had left Reading with the countess, who, 
upon these sundry considerations, and for that she 
had been gone more than two hours, was let go on 
her road to Oxenford without pursuit. 

The burghers of Reading who had endeavoured 
to save themselves from plunder and violence by 
throwing up their caps and shouting for the errant 
queen, but who had been plundered and beaten all 
the same (nay, divers of them were wounded by 
sword and lance, and cruelly maimed), now came 
to our abbey-gates, making their throats hoarse 
with shouting for King Stephen and the good and 
gracious Lord of Caversham ; and some of the 
richer franklins of the township and neighbour- 
hood, who had escaped being plundered by Matilda's 
party, upon learning the sad case in which we, the 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 81 

monks, had been left, hastened to bring us meat 
and drink. 

Sir Alain de Bohun, who had not seen his wife 
or his home for many a sad day, was about to ride 
across the fields homeward, when his ladie's page 
was seen running across the King's Mead towards 
our abbey. 

" Yonder comes one from Caversham," said Sir 
Alain ; " and I read by his looks and his hurry 
that he bringeth no good news !" 

" Fear not," said the abbat, who saw that his 
nephew's cheek was growing pale, " for the saints 
have ever defended thy roof-tree, and as I told 
thee before, the Ladie Alfgiva and the children 
were as well as well could be at the hour of noon 
of yesterday, when I did see them." 

Nevertheless, the little page did bring bad news, 
or tidings which much afflicted Sir Alain and our 
lord abbat. There had been treachery at Caver- 
sham, and a fast friend had played loose. That 
sweet babe, the daughter of Sir Ingelric of Hun- 
tercombe, who had caused our household so much 
dismay four years agone, and had sent me and 
Philip the lay-brother on the night -journey to Sir 
Alain de Bohun's castle, had dwelt in that castle 
ever since, and had been nurtured with all delicacy 
and honour, like a child of the house. For a long 
season Sir Ingelric, her father, had no safe home 
unto which he could take her ; for since the begin- 
ning of these unhappy wars, no house in England 
could be called safe that was not moated and bat- 
tlemented, and strongly garrisoned ; and if Sir 
Ingelric had possessed a castellum, he had no gen- 
tle dame unto whom he could confide his infant 
female child. But the Ladie Alfgiva was as ten- 



82 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

der as a mother to this babe, and this tenderness 
became the greater when death deprived her of her 
own little daughter. Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, 
who had taken vengeance on the destroyer of his 
wife and home, Sir Jocelyn de Brienne, in the 
Falbury almost at our abbey gates, seemed engaged 
for life in a blood-feud with Sir Jocelyn's family 
and friends, and to be for ever wedded to the 
party of King Stephen by the strong ties of neces- 
sity and revenge. Many were the combats he had 
fought between that time his house and wife were 
burned, and the time when King Stephen prepared 
for that campaign which had ended so disastrously 
at Lincoln. During this long and busy interval 
he went not often to Caversham, so that his child 
grew up with little knowledge of him. The little 
Alice was wont to call Sir Alain de Bohun her 
father, even as she called the Ladie Alfgiva mother. 
Once or twice within the last twelve months Sir 
Ingelric had said, that since his house was well 
nigh rebuilt, he should have a safe bower for his 
daughter, and that Alice must soon home with 
him ; and each time he had said the words the 
child had run from him to the Ladie Alfgiva, and 
had clung round her neck, weeping and saying 
that she would not leave her mother ; and her play- 
mate and champion, that right gallant boy Arthur 
de Bohun, the only son, and now the only child, of 
Sir Alain, who was some four years older than 
Alice, said that she must not leave him. It was 
noticed upon these occasions, that although Sir 
Ingelric began as in a jest, his countenance soon 
grew dark and his voice harsh, and that he almost 
shook his child when he took her on his knee and 
told her that she must love her father, and must 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 83 

not always be a burthen unto other people. Nay, 
the last time that he said these words he pressed 
the little Alice's arm so violently that he left the 
blackening marks of his ringers upon it. Other 
things were noted as well by Sir Alain de Bohun 
as by the Ladie Alfgiva. It is not every man 
that is chastened by calamity. Sir Ingelric's great 
misfortune had made him fierce, proud, and re- 
bellious to the will of Heaven ; and, in losing his 
fair young wife, he had lost his best guide and 
monitor. He became hard of heart, and grasping, 
and covetous ; and as for more than three years the 
party of King Stephen had been almost every- 
where victorious, he had abundant opportunities of 
satisfying his appetite for havoc and booty. But 
the more he gained the more he wished to get 9 
and by degrees he gave up his whole soul to ava- 
rice and ambition. Sir Alain de Bohun, who 
looked for no advantage unto himself, who adhered 
to King Stephen out of loyalty and affection, and 
who kept out of the horrible and unnatural warfare 
as much as he thought his duty would allow him, 
entertained apprehensions that his friend Sir In- 
gelric loved the war for what he gained by it, and 
would not be very steady to any losing party. Sir 
Ingelric, however, had fought bravely for King 
Stephen at Lincoln, and had there been taken 
prisoner. But he had paid a ransom to his captor, 
and had been some time at large, busied in putting 
the finishing hand to the strong castle which he 
had raised on his lands at Speen. Though the 
distance was so short to Oaversham, he had not 
gone once thither until the evening of the unhappy 
day on which the Countess of Anjou had come to 
our abbey — that is, the evening of yesterday — but 



64 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

then he had told the Ladie Alfgiva that as the 
weather was so fine and the country so tranquil 
(alack ! the good people at Caversham had not 
seen the arrival of Matilda and her young Jeze- 
bels at our abbey), he would take the two children 
forth for a walk in the meadows by the river side ; 
and the false knight had gone forth with the 
children, and neither he nor the children had since 
been seen or heard of. As the little page came to 
this point in his dismal story, not only our prior, 
but several of us less entitled to speak in such a 
presence, cried out, " That knight in the black 
mail who kept his vizor down, and that went 
away with the countess, was none other than Sir 
Ingelric of Huntercombe ;" and our abbot said, 
" Verily, the voice was that of Sir Ingelric !" 

" Woe for these changes !" said Sir Alain de 
Bohun, " woe and shame upon them. If men have 
no faith even with old friends — if men do shift 
from side to side like the inconstant wind, this war 
will never know an end, and truth, and honour, and 
mercy will depart the land ! Sir Ingelric of 
Huntercombe ! I aided thee in thy wretchedness, 
and King Stephen did afterwards hand thee on the 
road to riches and greatness. I first gave thee 
money and the labour of my serfs that thou mightest 
re-edify thy house, but now thou hast built to thy- 
self a strong castle, wherein thou thinkest thou 
canst defy me, now thou believest the cause of 
Stephen to be desperate, and therefore dost thou 
raise thy hand against me, and steal away, like a 
thief, not only the child that was thine own, but 
also mine only son, that the woman of Anjou may 
have my dearest hostage in her power. May God 
of his mercy protect my dear boy ! But, oh Sir 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 85 

Jngelric, thy treachery is ill-laid and ill-timed, 
thy cunning is foolishness. Great things have hap- 
pened since thou hast been castle-building, and 
thou wilt find that thou hast quitted the stronger 
for the weaker party. Hereafter will I make thee 
pay, if not for thy black ingratitude to me, for thy 
disloyalty to thy too bountiful king, and for the 
tears my ladie wife will shed for her double loss I" 

Here moisture very like a tear stood in the eyes 
of the Lord of Caversham : but grief gave way to 
wrath as he said that the felon knight might have 
taken his own child, which would long since have 
been in its grave but for the Ladie Alfgiva, without 
robbing him of his son. 

Our good abbat, who had his prophetic seasons, 
said, " Grieve not, my well-beloved nephew. The 
two children will do well together, and thou wilt 
soon have them restored to thy house : they were 
born to be together and love one another, and so 
will not be separated. Alice will repay thee here- 
after for the ingratitude and treasons and other evil 
doings of her father." 

Here I, Felix the novice, and Philip the lay- 
brother, who had carried little Alice from the 
abbey unto Caversham, and who had loved the 
child ever since, did say " Amen ! amen ! So be 
it." 

" The children," said an honest franklin who 
had stood by all the time of these discourses, '■' be 
surely gone with the Countess of Anjou for Oxen- 
ford ; as on the road beyond the town I saw a 
blue-eyed boy riding before a man-at-arms, and a 
little girl in the arms of a waiting-woman who rode 
close to the countess on a piebald horse, and both 
the children were crying piteously." 

e 3 



86 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

" Then will we recover them at Oxenford," said 
one of the knights. 

Sir Alain de Bohun, with a part of the company 
who had come with him, mounted for Caversham ; 
and when Sir Alain began to ride, I could see that 
he rode hotly and impatiently. The rest of the 
knightly company we entertained in the abbey as 
best we could, and lodged them for that night, 
the good franklins having brought us in some clean 
straw and rushes for that purpose. The commoner 
sort slept in the open air on the Falbury, with their 
weapons by their sides. 

But before the troublous day was finished, other 
dismal tidings and sights of woe were brought to 
our house. John Appold and Ealph Wain, two 
franklins whilome of good substance, who farmed 
some of our outstanding abbey lands beyond Pang- 
bourne, came to tell us that their houses had been 
burned, their granaries emptied, and the plough- 
hinds and shepherds and all the serfs driven away 
by Matilda's people, who had chained them toge- 
ther by their iron neck-collars, and had goaded 
them before them like cattle with the points of their 
lances. And before these sad tales were well 
ended, Will Shakeshaft, a faithful steward who 
dwelt in a house our lord abbat had at Purley, 
arrived on a maimed horse, and with a ghastly cut 
across his face, to let us know that violence had 
been done to his wife, and that that fair house had 
been burned also. A little later there came three 
of our poor serfs howling so that it was dreadful 
to hear, and holding in the air their red and still 
bleeding stumps. They had been amputated and 
then liberated, in order that they might go forth 
and show all the people what they had to expect if 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 87 

they opposed or so much as forbore to aid and join 
the empress-queen. As the night became dark, 
we could trace the march of the countess by a line 
of fire and smoke. Such were the things which 
drove the poor people of England into impiety and 
blasphemy, making them say that Christ and the 
saints had fallen asleep ! And these things lasted 
in the land for fifteen more years. 



( 88 ) 



Y. 



When baptized Christian men did steal the chil- 
dren of other Christian men, yea, and torture and 
slay them, no marvel was it that the unconverted 
Israelites, who had been allowed to come into the 
land in great numbers since the Norman conquest, 
should do deeds of the like sort. So it was, that 
in King Stephen's reign the rich Jews of Norwich 
did buy a Christian child from its poor parents a 
little before Easter, and on the Long Friday, when 
the church was mourning for the crucifixion of our 
Lord, they tortured him after the same manner as- 
our Lord was tortured, and did nail him on a rood 
in mockery of our Saviour ; and afterwards buried 
him. These sacrilegious and cruel Jews thought 
that their horrible crime would be concealed, but 
it was revealed from above, and the people of Nor- 
wich smote the Jews and tortured them as they 
merited ; and the Lord showed that the Christian 
child was a holy martyr : and the monks took him 
and buried him with all honour and reverence in 
Norwich Minster ; and he is called Saint William, 
and through our Lord wonderful miracles are 
wrought at his tomb even in our own day, and his 
festival is kept with becoming solemnity on the 
twenty-fifth of the kalends of March. 

Sad and sinful was it for Christian parents to 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 89 

sell their children to Jew, or even to Gentile. The 
evil practice had once been common in England, 
and in the port of Bristowe children were once sold 
in great numbers to be carried into Ireland and 
elsewhere ; but the church had put down the un- 
natural traffic, and when King Stephen came to 
the throne no freeman would have sold his child. 
But want and hunger now severed the natural tie, 
and starving parents sold their starving children 
rather than see them die before their eyes and they 
unable to help them. Yea, frantic mothers would 
give their infants from their dried-up breasts to 
any strangers that would promise to nourish them. 
Horresco repetens ! I do shudder in the telling of 
it, but so it was. Fair English children were 
again sold to traffickers on the western coast, who 
carried them into Ireland, and in such numbers 
that the slave-market of the Irishry was all over- 
stocked with them. In the happy and plentiful 
days which now be in the land such things are 
hard to believe ; but I, as a novice, did often see 
them with mine own eyes, and the causes that led 
thereunto. Yea, have I seen the poor people of 
England roaming by the wayside and eating gar- 
bage which scarcely the fox or the foul birds of 
the air would touch, rambling in the woods and 
fields in search of roots and berries, ay, grazing 
on the bank-side like cattle, or that great sinner 
Nebuchadnezzar ; for flocks and herds were swept 
away, and slaughtered, and wasted by the armed 
bands that ever ranged the country, or were kept 
penned up within the castles of the strong men — 
those pestilent barons and knights that were now 
for Matilda and now for Stephen, and always for 
plunder and all crime, living and fattening upon 



90 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

great and bloody thievings — magna et sanguineo- 
lentia latrocinia : and the fields could not be cul- 
tivated because of the continual passing and 
repassing, and burning, and fighting, and slaying 
of these armed hosts and bands of robbers, who 
did worse than the heathen had ever done; for 
after a time they spared neither church nor church- 
yard, neither a bishop's land nor an abbat's land, 
and not more the lands of a priest than the fields 
of a franklin, but plundered both monks and 
clerks ! And so it came to pass that nearly every 
man that could, robbed another, and carried away 
his wife or daughter, and did with her what he list. 
If two men or three came riding to a town, all the 
township fled, concluding them to be robbers. 
Some of our bishops and learned men continually 
did excommunicate them and curse them ; but the 
effect thereof was nought, for they were one and 
all accursed, and forsworn, and abandoned ; and 
grieves me to say that too many bishops and 
churchmen were men of violent and unsteady 
councils and castle-builders themselves, waging 
war like the lay lords, and being as void as they 
of steadiness and loyalty, and mercy for the people. 
Verily I myself have seen prelates clad in armour 
and mounted on war-horses, even as at the time of 
the Conquest, and in that guise directing the siege 
or the attack, or drawing lots with the rest for the 
booty. The strong men constantly laid gilds on 
the towns, and called it by a Norman name which 
signifyeth torture; and when the poor townfolk 
had no more to give, then they plundered and 
burned the towns; so that thou mightest go a 
whole day's journey and never behold a man sit- 
ting in a town or see a field that was tilled. To 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. ' 91 

till the ground was as useless as to plough the sea, 
for no man could hope to reap that which he 
sowed. Thus the earth bare little or no corn ; 
and bread became of a fearful dear price ; and 
flesh, and cheese, and butter were there none for 
the poor. Ay, franklins who had been rich men, 
and who had kept good house and been bountiful 
to the poor and to mother church, were seen beg- 
ging alms on the road. Many of the poorest died 
of u hunger on a soil which God had blessed with 
fertility, but which sinful men had turned into a 
wilderness ; and many, going distraught, threw 
themselves into the rivers, or hanged themselves in 
the woods. This was greater woe than England 
had witnessed during the long wars of the Norman 
conquest ; and it was in this abyss of misery that 
fathers and mothers sold their children. 

On the morning after his going to Caversham 
Sir Alain de Bohun returned unto our house with 
the knights who had gone with him ; and before it 
was time to begin the service of tertia in the 
church, he and all the company, as well foot as 
horse, marched away to the north-west. They in- 
tended for Oxenford, but did not take the direct 
road ; for they had learned from scouts that Ma- 
tilda's party had been strengthened by some bands 
from the eastward, and Sir Alain and his friends 
hoped to get an increase of strength in the west- 
ward before they turned round upon the countess. 
But while the partisans of King Stephen were 
marching to the westward and gaining great 
strength on the borders of Wiltshire, the Countess 
of Anjou suddenly decamped from Oxenforcl and 
began a march for Winchester, for she had at 
length conceived suspicion and alarm at the con- 



'92 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

duct of the Bishop of Winchester, the king's 
brother, and our lord the pope's legate. Intending 
to pass through Berkshire into Hampshire and unto 
Winchester, she took her course by Cumnor, 
Abingdon, and Wallingforcl. The news of her 
approach was a death-blow to our good abbat. He 
had been for some time past declining. He could 
not away with the thought of Matilda's evil doings 
unto our house. Being a man formerly addicted 
to hospitality, good company, cheerful conversa- 
tion, music, and innocent mirth, he was observed 
to forsake all this with much melancholy and pen- 
siveness, and so to droop and pine away ; but yet 
was it the news of the countess's coming that gave 
the finishing stroke. Eheu ! and Miserrimus ! A 
better monk or a nobler lord abbat was never slain 
by princely violence and the wickedness of excom- 
municate men. He was at Sir Alain de Bohun's 
castle, and I and Philip the lay-brother were in 
attendance upon him when our scouts brought the 
intelligence that Matilda was at Abingdon with 
the heads of her columns pointing along the road 
towards Reading. The good, kindhearted man had 
gone to Caversham in order to console the Ladie 
Alfgiva, whom he found, like Rachel, mourning for 
her children, yet not mourning like one that would 
not be comforted. But comfortless and sad was 
the face of our lord abbat when he gave his niece 
the parting blessing, and warned her to look well 
to her castle, and bade the warder to keep close 
the gates, and not admit so much as a strange dog 
within the walls. There had been a slow fever in 
his veins ever since the bad visit of the Angevin 
countess, and now his limbs shook and his eyes 
seemed to swim in his head, and he had much ado 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 93 

to mount the rough upland horse which had been 
procured for him in lieu of his gentle-pacecl palfrey. 
" Felix, my boy," said he unto me as we descended 
the slopes of Caversham towards the river, " ride 
close to my bridle-hand, for I am faint, and a heavy 
sickness is upon my heart." As he rode across the 
meads, the breeze, which blew freshly and coolly 
from the broad river, did somewhat revive him ; 
but anon he complained of the rough motion of his 
steed, and gently lamented the loss of his ambling 
grey, which Matilda had stolen from him so foully. 
When near to the great gate of the abbey he turned 
round and looked towards the river and the Caver- 
sham hills that were shining in the setting sun ; 
and then, as he went under the archway, I saw tears 
drop from his eyes, and I heard him mutter to 
himself, " ' Tis a right beauteous sight, but I shall 
see it no more." And that night, and before the 
middle watches thereof, praying for the community 
of Reading and all England besides, and imploring 
the saints to protect the house at Caversham and 
the two sweet children, he turned his face to the 
wall and died, to the unspeakable grief of every 
honest member of the house. He left this troubled 
world in such good repute as a virtuous and holy 
man, that assuredly he merited beatification, if 
not the higher glories of canonization. — In Do- 
mino moritur. 

Before going to his bed, our good abbat held 
council with all the obedientiarii and sworn monks 
of the abbey, and I was of the number of those 
who thought that this exertion, and his long and 
anxious speaking, hastened his demise. His opi- 
nions were, that the monks ought to keep close 
their gates, and call in their retainers and some of 



94 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

the townfolk of Heading to help them to defend 
the house ; that Matilda could not tarry long for a 
siege or any other object, as Sir Alain de Bohun 
and his party would soon retrace their steps ; and 
that the monks, having made good their house by 
standing on the defensive, should remain neutral in 
the horrible war, taking no step and raising no 
voice either for King Stephen or Queen Matilda, 
until they saw what course was taken by the pope's 
legate or a synod of the church. All present at 
this council, whether cloister monks or monks 
holding office, agreed that this advice was the best 
that could be given, and protested that they would 
follow it ; and Hildebrand, the sub-prior, was the 
loudest of any in his, prayers that St. James and 
St. John the Evangelist, patrons of our house, 
would long preserve the life of our good old abbat, 
who had governed the abbey for many years with 
great wisdom and gentleness ; and, sooth to say, m 
all that time he had ruled as a fond father rules 
his own children, and never did he sadden the heart 
of an honest man and faithful servant of the church, 
or cause a tear to flow until he died. 

But, woe the while ! the wickedness, the treachery, 
and malice of the times, had spread themselves on 
^very side and to every community ; and some 
members of our once quiet and loving brotherhood 
there were that hid Judas hearts under fawning 
countenances ; and before the passing bell ceased to 
toll for our abbat's death, these unhappy men took 
secret council with one another, and resolved to 
act in a manner altogether different from that which 
had been advised, and that which they had promised 
and vowed to follow. And, lo ! on the second 
evening after the death of our good abbat, when 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 95 

the Angevin woman and her host came again unto 
our house, like a whirlwind, with lances in the air, 
and clouds of dust rolling before their path, the 
sub-prior and his fautors, including as well some 
of the franklins and retainers, as monks and no- 
vices, and lay brothers of the abbey, did drive away 
the other party, and lower our drawbridge, and 
throw wide open our great gate, and sing hosan- 
nas, and cry, " Long live the empress-queen ! God 
bless the sweet face of Queen Matilda, the lawful 
sovereign of this realm ! " And again Matilda came 
within the cloisters, and took possession of our house 
with her lawless men of war and her gadabout 
damsels. This time they could not rob, for we had 
not the wherewithal, unless they took our gowns, 
hoods, and sandals, and our flesh and bones ; but 
they did worse things than steal. Matilda ordered 
that on the instant the fathers of the house should 
proceed to elect and appoint a new abbat. 

" Dread ladie," said Reginald, our prior, now the 
highest in office, " This cannot be ! It is against 
the rules of our order ; it is against the canons of 
holy church ; it is against the feelings of humanity ; 
it is contrary to common decency ! Our late lord 
abbat lies as yet unburied within our walls. He 
must be first interred honorably, and as becometh 
the dignity of the house ; and before we, the fathers 
of the house, can open a Chapter, many masses of 
xequiem must be said, and the guidance of the Spirit 
must be invoked to help us in our election, and 
notice must be sent unto the head of our order, 
and alms must be given unto the poor. Albeit, I 
see not what alms we can give, since our house 
hath been so " 

" Rebel monk," cried Matilda, * reproach not 



96 A LEGEND OF HEADING ABBEY. 

thy queen ! But I do perceive that thou art a 
fautor of Stephen, like the old rebel that hath de- 
parted. I told him that the mitre was falling from 
his head, and I now tell thee that it shall never drop 
upon thine." 

" Would that it had pleased the saints to keep 
it on the head which wore it so long, and with so 
much honour," said our bold prior. " I never 
aimed at it, or had a wish for it. I would not 
stoop my body, or stretch out my hand, to pick it 
up, if it lay at my feet. I would never wear it 
except forced so to do by canonical election, and 
the free and strong will of my brothers. Matilda, 
thou that ransackest houses of religion, and the 
very tomb of thy father, and tramplest on the monks 
that live to pray for the soul of thy father, I would 
not accept the mitre and crozier from thee if thou 
wert to fall on thy knees and implore me to do it ! 
I stand here as an humble but faithful servant of this 
community — as a lowly member of the great family 
of St. Benedict ; and if I raise my voice, it is only 
for the sake of our religion and unchangeable rules. 
Thy men-at-arms need not grind their teeth, and 
point their lances at me. I fear them not ; and in 
this cause would face torture and death." 

" By the splendour I" cried Matilda, " we do 
but waste time in speech with such as thou art. 
I tell thee, thou traitor and malignant, that the 
election shall be made forthwith ; and that before I 
quit this house I will see an honest man put into 
the abbatial chair, and confirm him therein by our 
royal deed. Thou wilt not question, oh monk, 
that the election of a Chapter is nought without 
the assent and confirmation of the lawful sovereign ; 
and as I have weighty matters in hand, and will 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 97 

soon be far away from Heading, there might be 
great delay in obtaining my confirmation if it were 
not given now." 

At this passage the sub-prior, bowing before 
Matilda more lowly than he was ever seen to bow 
before the effigies of our Ladie in the Ladie's chapel, 
said yea and verily, and that this last was a weighty 
consideration before which the rule of St. Bene- 
dict might, in some points, give way ; and that in 
times of trouble and discord and anarchy like these 
we were living in, the royal abbey of Heading 
could not with safety be left for a single day with- 
out a head. 

This discourse of the sub-prior much chafed our 
fearless and honest prior, Heginald, who well knew 
the man and his ungodly designs ; but before the 
prior's wrath allowed him to speak, our sacrist 
brought forth the book and opened the rules of 
our order, and read the same with an audible yet 
gentle voice, and with the same gentleness did 
show that much time must be allowed for mature 
deliberation ; that a Chapter could not be assem- 
bled while the house was full of strangers and 
armed men, for that elections must be free and un- 
biassed by fear or by any other worldly considera- 
tion ; and then he did fall to quoting the charters 
of the Beauclerc, which direct that on the death 
of a lord abbat possession of the monastery, with 
all its rights and privileges, shall remain in the 
prior, and at the disposal of the prior and the 
monks of the Chapter, and that none shall in any 
ways meddle in the election of the new abbat : and 
when the sacrist had thus spoken, the cellarer or 
bursar, the second father of the convent, who had 
charge of everything relating to the food of the 



98 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

monks, and who always knew best, by the eatings 
who were present and who absent, did beg it might 
be observed that three cloister monks were absent,, 
one disobediently and contumaciously (meaning 
hereby Father Anselm, who had absconded with 
the countess on her previous visit) ; but two, to 
wit, the chamberlain and the almoner, on the 
business of the abbey — and without the votes of 
these two named fathers no election could be legal 
or canonical. 

u But my good cellarius," said the sub-prior, in 
a very dulcet and persuasive tone of voice, " it 
yet behoves us to think of the dangers of the 
times, and to provide for the security of this royal 
abbey and God-fearing community, even though 
we should depart from the rigid letter of some 
of our minor rules. Remember, oh cellarius, that 
these be days of trouble, and that we be living in 
the midst of discord and anarchy, and treachery^ 
and " 

" Treachery, quotha ! I wis there was no treach- 
ery in this community until thou didst bring it 
amongst us," cried our prior ; " nor did we know 
discord or anarchy in our abbey, or in any part of 
the manors and hundreds appertaining unto this 
house until thou, oh Matilda, didst come to our 
gates ! Troubles there were around us, and for 
those troubles the good men of our house grieved 
— not without labouring to alleviate them ; but we 
were a quiet community when thou didst come 
thundering at our gates, bringing with thee thy 
subtle maidens and thy violent men of war ! and 
hadst thou never come we had still been at peace. 
If thou wouldst listen to me now, I would say Get 
thee gone and cease from troubling us ! But 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 99 

orgeuil mesprise bon conseil, pride despiseth good 
counsel, and pride and hardness of heart will lead 
to thy undoing." 

Tradition reporteth that the wrath of William 
the Conqueror was a thing fearful to behold ; that 
the rage of the Red King was a consuming fire ; and 
that the slower and stiller but deeper hate of Henry 
the Beauclerc was like unto the grim visage of 
death ; yet do I doubt whether the wrath of all 
these three preceding kings, if put all together, 
could be so dreadful as that which the choleric 
daughter of the Beauclerc did now display : and 
certes the extreme passion of rage in a woman, 
even when she hath not a regal and tyrannical 
power, is fearful to behold. From the redness of 
the fire she became pale as ashes ; but then she 
reddened again as she shouted " Ho ! my men-at- 
arms, gag me that old traitor !" 

" Tyrannous woman, that the sins of the land 
have brought into England, the truth will endure 
and be the same though I speak it not. Thou 
hast violated the sanctuary — thou hast dishonoured 
and plundered the very grave of thy father ! See 
that he rise not from the grave to rebuke thee." 
I u Drag the traitor hence ; put chains upon him ; 
cast him into the dungeon," cried the unfaithful 
wife of the Angevin count ; and the men-at-arms 
who had laid their rude hands upon the prior to 
gag him, did drag the prior out of the Aula Magna. 
And when he was gone, Matilda swore oaths too 
terrible to be repeated, that, seeing she must her- 
self away on the morrow, she would leave a gar- 
rison of her fiercest fighting men in the abbey, and 
devastate all the abbey lands that lay on her march, 
if our fathers did not forthwith elect and appoint 



100 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

a lord abbat true to her party and obedient to her 
will. Most of the officials and cloister monks held 
down their heads and were sore afeard. Not so 
the sacrist and cellarer, who cried " Charter ! 
Charter !" and repeated that such election could 
not be, and who were thereupon dragged forth 
and put in duresse with the bold prior. And now 
the sub-prior, who never doubted that the choice 
was to fall upon him, did entreat those who had 
the right of voting to submit to the will of God 
and the commandment of the queen, and so save 
the house from ruin : and some he did terrify, and 
some cajole, talking apart with them, and telling 
them that he would be good lord and indulgent 
abbat unto them all. At last the timid gave way, 
and the monks of delicate conscience would resist 
no longer ; and the sub-prior, with a smile upon 
his countenance, said to Matilda, in his blandest 
voice, that the community was ready to elect 
whomsoever her grace might be pleased to name. 

" 'Tis prudent and wise in the community," said 
Matilda ; and then she clapped her hands thrice, as 
great lords or ladies use to do when they would 
summon a menial or call in their fool to make them 
sport ; and as she clapped her hands she said, 
" Come in, my Lord Abbat elect !" 

And then, from an inner apartment, where he 
had been listening all the while, there glided into 
the great hall, and stood before us, with an un- 
blushing and complacent countenance, that rule- 
breaker and deserter — Father Anselm. 

I did think that our sub-prior would have fallen 
to the ground in a swoon, for his legs trembled 
beneath him, and his face became as ashy with 
grief and disappointment as that of the countess 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 101 

had lately been with rage : his eye, fixed immove- 
ably on Father Anselm, became glazed and dull, 
like the eye of a dead fish, and instead of a cry of 
wonderment, I heard a rattling in his throat. But 
in a while the sub-prior recovered, and ventured to 
say that the Chapter could by no means elect one 
who had broken his vow of obedience, and who 
was thereby under censure and interdict. 

" In absenting myself from the house, I did but 
obey the command laid on me by the queen's grace," 
said Father Anselm. 

" Not the sovereign ladie, nay, nor the sovereign 
lord of the land, can give such command without 
the foreknowledge and consent of the Lord Abbat, 
or of the prior in the abbat's absence," said the 
sub-prior, whose voice was growing bolder ; " and 
dread ladie, I tell thee again, that the chapter 
cannot elect this monk — I tell thee that I myself 
will protest against such choice, and defeat such 
election." 

" Ha !" cried Matilda, " say est thou so ? Then 
shalt thou join the other rebel monks. Men-at- 
arms, away with him ! He but wanted the mitre 
for his own ugly head ; but my dear mass-priest, 
thou shalt have it, and none but thee, for I can rely 
on thy faith and love, and thou art the handsomest 
monk that ever shaved a crown or wore a hood." 
And as she spake the last words, she looked so 
lovingly at him that it was a shame to see. 

Well ! our false and double-dealing sub-prior 
was whirled away to the dungeon, and the remaining 
officials and cloister monks were commanded by 
Matilda to begin the election of Father Anselm 
and finish it off hand, the countess vowing by the 

F 



102 A LEGENB OF READING ABBEY. 

-visage of St. Luke that she would not take food 
again until the thing was done. 

The terrible threats of the countess and the 
subtle arguments which Father Hildebrand, the 
sub-prior, had made use of, in the belief that he 
was to be our abbat, had such weight with the 
fathers that they kissed the jewelled hand of Matilda, 
and went into the chapter-house ; and there, in less 
time than had been wont to be spent in deliberation 
on the slightest business of the house (mailed knights 
and fierce men-at-arms standing by the chapter-door 
the while), they did name and elect the runagate 
Anselm to be our lord abbat, the monks of tender 
conscience merely holding up their hands in assent, 
and saying no word, but uttering in their secret 
souls that they acted under fear and violence, and 
that all this was un canonical work and foul, and 
against the rule of St. Benedict. And then they 
all came forth from the chapter-house, singing 
Benedictus Dominus ; and the countess and her 
painted damsels looked out from the windows of 
the abbat's house and laughed, and the armed and 
ungodly multitude set up a shout, as though they 
had gained a great victory. I will not tell how, 
in Father Anselm's inauguration in the church, 
the rules of our order, the canons, the decretals of 
councils, and the bulls of the pope, were all trans- 
gressed, or turned into a jest and mockery : these 
things are not to be forgotten, but I will not relate 
them. Instead of a godly bishop, it was the 
countess herself that placed the mitre on the head, 
and the ring on the finger of Father Anselm, and 
that gave him the first kiss and accolade — Oscu- 
lum Pacts, while Te Deum laudamus was being 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 103 

sung in the choir ; but verily was it sung in so 
faint and plaintive a manner, that it sounded 
more like a Miserere Domine. But when it was 
over, the intrusive abbat was kissed by all the 
convent, according to rule ; and Benedicite having 
been said, Father Anselm gave thanks to the 
monks for that they had chosen him, the least of 
them all, to be their lord and shepherd, not on ac- 
count of his own merits, but solely by the will of 
God. O ! sinful and sacrilegious Anselm, better 
had it been for thee that thou hadst never been 
born ! 

The will of the wicked woman was thus accom- 
plished, but it brought her neither future worldly 
success nor present peace. That same night as I, 
Felix the Novice, lay in my cell unable to sleep, 
mourning for the loss of our good lord abbat, and 
ruminating on all which had since befallen us, I 
heard a cry, a piercing shriek, which rang through 
our cloisters and corridors, and through every part 
of our great abbey. Yea, as I afterwards learned, 
it was heard by the prior and by those that were 
with him in the prison underground. Cardiff castle 
did not ring and echo with so shrill a shriek of 
agony when the red-hot copper basin was held over 
the face of the Beauclerc's unhappy brother Duke 
Robert to sear his eyes and destroy his sight, as 
did now the abbey of Reading, which was mainly 
built in expiation of that great crime of Henricus. 
It was followed by a loud call for lights — lights in 
the queen's sleeping chamber. And lights were 
carried thither, and Matilda slept no more that 
night ; and before the dawn of day preparations 
were made for her departure. The shriek was 
from her, the vision was hers. O beate virgine ! 

f2 



104 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

save us from ill deeds and an ill conscience, and 
the dreams they do bring. The vision of the 
Beauclerc's daughter, as it afterwards came to my 
knowledge, was this : — her father appeared before 
her, holding in his right hand his heart, which had 
not been brought to our abbey with his body, but 
which had been deposited in the church of St. 
Mary at Rouen, which his mother had founded ; 
and this heart did distil great gouts of blood, as if 
in agony for the wrong which had been done our 
abbey, and the insults which had been heaped upon 
his grave ; and the face of the spectrum was 
menacing and awful, and the visionary voice full 
of dread — the words so terrible that the countess 
would never repeat them save to her confessor. 

In the same watches of the night there were 
moans and groans in the prison underground. 
Nor was it only the upbraiding of an evil con- 
science that caused Hildebrand, our sub-prior, so 
to lament and cry out. For our bellicose and 
choleric prior Reginald did beat him, and tweak 
him by the nose, reviling him as a Judas Iscariot ; 
and, perad venture, he would have slain him out- 
right, or have done him some great bodily harm, 
if the gentler and more circumspect sacrist and 
cellarer had not been there to intercede and inter- 
vene. Our prior was the strongest man that then 
lived in all these parts. A terrible man in his 
wrath was our prior ! But his wrath was never 
kindled except against evil-doers, and the swinkers 
and oppressors of the poor. With all others he 
was as gentle as a lamb, and he was ever indulgent 
to error and all minor offences, as I, who lived 
long under his rule, can well testify — requiem 

iETERNAM. 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 105 

I, Felix, having in the bye-gone times had much 
familiarity and friendship with our two backslid- 
ing novices, Urswick the Whiteheaded from Pang- 
bourne, and John-a-Blount from Maple-Durham, 
did much marvel how it fared with them since 
their apostacy, and did diligently seek them out in 
the great press which came with the countess, to 
the end that I might talk gently with them upon 
their transgressions, and obtain from them some 
knowledge of what had become of the little Alice 
and my prime friend young Arthur de Bohun, 
hoping hereby to gain tidings grateful and cheer- 
ful to the ear of the good and bountiful Ladie 
Alfgiva. But neither in the evening nor in the 
morning could I see Urswick or John among the 
people of the countess. Yet in the morning, just 
before the departure, I gave a bowman my only 
piece of money, and learned from him that a part 
of Matilda's host with sundry wains and horse- 
litters had not come with her unto Reading, but 
had taken a shorter road for Winchester ; and so I 
did conclude that my two quondam comrades had 
gone with that company, and I did comfort myself 
with thinking that they had yet so much grace left 
in them as to have been averse to come back and 
witness our exceeding great misery. Yet did the 
archer spoil this my comfort by telling me that 
two black-eyed damsels had gone with that divi- 
sion, riding like men upon big war-horses. Of 
children the man knew nought ; nor he nor any 
man of the meaner sort had been allowed to look 
into the wains or to approach the litters. There 
might be children, he said, among this moveable and 
vagrant host, but he had seen none. Here again did 
I grieve, for I loved Alice and Arthur right well, 



106 A LEGEND OP READING ABBEY. 

and would have laid down an untold treasure in gold 
to have it in my power to speak comfortably unto 
the Ladie Alfgiva. 

At the command of Father Anselm the monks 
of the house, and we the novices likewise, did form 
in processional order, and accompany Matilda from 
our gates even unto the Hallowed Brook, that branch 
of the swift and clear Kennet which flo weth by the 
township ; and halting on the bank of that holy 
and peaceful water, which ought not to have heard 
such notes, Father Anselm made us chaunt Hosanna 
and Jubilate, and promised to the Angevin countess 
a bloody and complete victory over all her 
enemies. And hence, upon famam vulgi, the 
trifling and ungrounded talk of the common 
people, who, in parts remote from Reading, knew 
not the violence which had been used, it was pro- 
claimed to the world that the abbat and monks of 
Reading, in this unhappy year eleven hundred and 
forty-one, had received the empress-queen with 
the highest honours, and had made themselves her 
servants and beadsmen. Pater de Ccelis, Deus, 
miserere nobis ! 



( 107 ) 



VI. 



While she was yet at Oxenford, Matilda had 
rudely summoned the Bishop of Winchester, legate 
to the pope and brother to King Stephen, to ap- 
pear in her presence and give an account of his 
actions and intentions. The bishop had replied 
that he was getting ready for her ; and this was 
true enough, for he was manning and victualling 
the castles which he had built within his diocese as 
at Waltham, Farnham, and divers other places. 
Upon quitting our house at Reading, Matilda hoped, 
by a rapid march, to surprise the bishop within 
Winchester, and to make him captive, and to send 
him loaded with chains to join the king his brother 
in Bristowe Castle, in despite of his legatine and 
episcopal character and the authority of the holy 
see. But the lord bishop was ever wary and well 
advised, and before the countess could reach Win- 
chester he withdrew from that most royal city, 
having first fortified his episcopal residence therein, 
and set up his brother's standard on the roof. 
Matilda was treacherously admitted into the royal 
castle at Winchester, whither she summoned her 
half-brother the great Earl of Gloucester, and her 
uncle David, king of Scots, who had been for some 
time in England vainly endeavouring to make her 
follow mild and wise counsels. The Scots king 



108 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and Gloucester, and the Earls of Hereford and 
Chester, went straight to Winchester and abided 
with the queen and her court in the castle. But 
the bishop had made his palace as strong as the 
castle, and when the party of Matilda laid siege to 
it, the bishop's garrison, being resolved not to 
yield, did many valorous and some very sinful 
deeds. They sallied more than once against the 
people of Matilda, and put them to the rout ; and 
they hurled combustibles from the palace, and set 
fire to the houses of the town that stood nearest to 
the palace in order to drive thence the enemy's 
archers ; but by their thus doing, the abbey of 
nuns within the town, and the monastery called 
the Hide without the town walls were consumed, 
to their great sin and shame. Here was a crucifix 
made of gold and silver and precious stones, the 
gift of King Canute, the Dane ; and it was seized 
by the ravenous flames, and was thrown from the 
rood-] oft to the ground, and was afterwards stripped 
of its ornaments by order of the bishop-legate him- 
self, and more than five hundred marks of silver 
and thirty marks of gold were found in it, and 
given as largesse to the soldiers ; for, whether they 
stood for Stephen or for Matilda, or whether they 
did battle with the sanction of the church or warred 
against its authority, these fighting men did mainly 
look to pay and plunder. And at a later season 
the abbey of nuns at Warewell w r as also burned by 
William de Ypres, an abandoned man, who feared 
neither God nor men, and who did change sides as 
often as any one ; but at this season he was for 
King Stephen, and he set fire to the religious house 
for that some of Matilda's people had secured them- 
selves within it. 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 109 

Having made a ruin all round the episcopal 
palace, the bishop's garrison, being confident of 
succour, waited the event. The legate did not 
make them wait long. Being reinforced by Queen 
Maud and the stout citizens of London, who to the 
number of two thousand took the field for King 
Stephen, clad in coats of mail, and wearing steel 
casques on their heads, like noble men of war 
(more money, I wis, had they in their pouches 
than most of our noble knights or pseudo proceres), 
he turned rapidly back upon Winchester, and be- 
sieged the besiegers there. By the first day of the 
Kalends of August, or nigh upon the festival of 
Saint Afra, saint and martyr, the bishop did gird 
with a close siege the royal castle of Winchester. 
Herein were Matilda, the King of Scots, the Earls 
of Gloucester, Hereford, and Chester, and many 
others of note ; and of all these not one would have 
escaped if it had not been for the respect paid by 
the bishop and the party of King Stephen for the 
festivals of the church, which verily ought to be 
held by all parties as Truces of God, neither party 
doing anything while such truce lasts. But when 
the siege had endured the space of forty and two 
days, and when those within the royal castle had 
eaten up all their victual, the 14th day of Sep- 
tember arrived, which blessed day was the festival 
of the Holy Rood, and a sabbath-day besides ; and 
lo ! at a very early hour in the morning of that 
day — Festa duplex, while my lord bishop's host 
were hearing mass, or confessing their sins — which 
alas ! were but too numerous — Matilda mounted a 
swift horse, and, attended by a strong and well- 
mounted escort, crept secretly and quietly out of 
the castle. Her half-brother the Earl of Glouces- 

f 3 



110 A LEGEND OP READING ABBEY. 

ter followed her at a short distance of time, with a 
number of knights, English, Angevins and Bra- 
bancons, who had all engaged to keep between the 
countess and her pursuers, and to risk their own 
liberty for the sake of securing hers. They all 
got a good way upon the Devizes road before the 
beleaguerers knew that they were gone. But so 
soon as it was known that they had broken the 
Truce of God, the bishop's people were to horse, 
and began a hot pursuit ; and at Stourbridge the 
Earl of Gloucester and his band of knights were 
overtaken, and, after a fierce battle, were for the 
most part made prisoners. But while the long 
fight lasted, the countess, still pressing on her swift 
steed, reached Devizes, the work of, and the cause 
of so much woe unto, the magnificent castle-build- 
ing Roger, late bishop of Sarum. But the strong 
castle of Devizes was not furnished with victual, so 
that the countess could not tarry there ; and being 
in a great fear as to what might befal her on the 
road, she put herself upon a feretrum or death-bier, 
as if she were dead, and caused herself to be drawn 
in a hearse from Devizes unto Gloucester, whereat 
she arrived in that guise, not without the wonder- 
ment of men and the anger of the saints. Of all 
who had formed her strong rearward guard on her 
flight from Winchester castle, the Earl of Hereford 
alone reached Gloucester castle, and he arrived in 
a wretched state, being wounded and almost naked. 
The other barons and knights who escaped from 
the fight of Stourbridge threw away their arms and 
essayed to escape in the disguise of peasants ; but 
some of them, betrayed by their foreign speech, 
were seized by the English serfs, who bound them 
with cords and drove them before them with whips 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. Ill 

to deliver them up to their enemies. Yea some of 
the churls did cruelly maltreat and maim these 
proud knights from beyond sea, thereby taking 
vengeance for the great wrongs and cruelties which 
by them had been committed. Nay men of pre- 
latical dignity were not respected, for they had had 
no bowels for the people, who now stripped them 
naked and scourged them. The King of Scots, 
Matilda's uncle, got safe back to his own kingdom ; 
but her half-brother, the most important prisoner 
that could be taken, was conveyed to Stephen's 
queen Maud, who laid him fast in Rochester castle, 
but without loading him with chains as Matilda 
had done unto Stephen, for Queen Maud was mer- 
ciful and generous of heart. 

Sir Alain de Bohun, who had joined the legate 
with a good force before the siege of Winchester 
Castle was begun, made haste to enter into that 
castle when it was abandoned by Matilda and given 
up by the few soldiers that remained in it. It was 
no thirst for blood and no appetite for plunder that 
made our good Caversham lord enter into the fort- 
alice ; but it was his fatherly love for his only boy, 
and his tenderness for the little Alice, who had 
grown up as his daughter. He thought that in so 
hurried and rough a departure the children whom 
he had traced to Winchester Castle must have been 
left therein ; but although he searched every part 
of the castle, as well below ground as above, he 
could not find the children, or any trace of them, 
nor could he from the prisoners taken learn more 
than that a fine young boy and a beautiful little 
girl, together with sundry foreign damsels, had 
been sent from Winchester a day or twain before 
the legate commenced the siege of the castle. Sir 



112 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Alain, albeit sorely disappointed, thanked Heaven 
that the children had not been separated. A little 
later in this year's terrible war, when Sir Alain de 
Bohun had discomfited a force commanded by Sir 
Ingelric of Huntercombe, his once cherished friend, 
but now his deadliest foe, and had well nigh taken 
Sir Ingelric prisoner, a writing was in secret de- 
livered unto the good lord of Caversham by one 
who wore pilgrim's weeds, but who was a wolf in 
sheep's clothing, and, in verity, a fautor and spy of 
the countess. Sir Alain being competently learned, 
and well able to read without the assistance of his 
mass-priest, who was not there to aid him, did 
peruse the secret missive, which did tell him in the 
name of Matilda that she had his son in sure-keep- 
ing, and would never deliver him up or permit the 
eye of father or mother to be blessed with the sight 
of him until Sir Alain should have abandoned the 
traitor Stephen and have joined the rightful queen 
of England ; and that if he long failed so to do, 
the boy would be sent beyond sea and immured in 
an Angevin castle, where all traces of him would 
be for ever lost, and where, doubtlessly, he would 
soon perish, " But if," said the letter, " Sir Alain 
de Bohun will follow the loyal and wise example 
of his once friend Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe and 
come join the queen, her grace will receive him 
with honour, and Sir Ingelric will forget that which 
is passed, and the boy shall be restored, and the 
little maiden likewise, and they shall be contracted 
in marriage, and the queen will give a rich dower 
to Alice out of her own royal domains, and Sir In- 
gelric and Sir Alain may live neighbourly and 
happily together as aforetime." 

Sir Alain, who could write as well as read, re- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 113 

plied in few words that his conscience forbade his 
breaking oaths to King Stephen ; that he could 
not change sides either through fear or through 
interest ; that he could not subject his lance to the 
distaff, or believe that the warlike baronage of Eng- 
land would ever live quietly under the rule of a 
woman ; that he must trust to God and his saints 
for the protection of his only child, as also for the 
well-being of his not less than daughter ; and that 
if it were the will of Heaven that the children, who 
had been brought up so lovingly together, should 
be conjoined at some future day in holy matrimony 
(of which in happier days there had been some talk 
between him and the little maiden's father), it 
would not be in the power of empress or queen to 
prevent it. "If," said Sir Alain de Bohun in 
terminating his epistle, " if, oh Matilda ! thou 
shouldest so far forget the tender feelings of a 
woman and mother as to do harm to mine only son, 
and thereby bring my wife with sorrow to the 
grave, God will so strengthen mine arm in battle 
as to enable me to take a fearful vengeance upon 
thy party and upon some that are nearest to thee. 
But thou wilt not do that which thou say est. So 
let me have no more secret, tampering missives. 
When Thamesis flows backward from Caversham 
to Oxenford instead of pursuing its course to the 
everlasting sea, then, but not until then, will Sir 
Alain de Bohun prove false to his oath and traitor 
to King Stephen." 

Circa id tempus, or nigh upon the time that Sir 
Alain sent this response unto Matilda, Sir Ingelric 
of Huntercombe, having composed his feud with 
that family and kindred, espoused the rich widow 
of that Sir Jocelyn who had burned his wife, the 



114 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

mother of the little Alice, in his house, and who 
had been by him slain in the Falbury of Reading, 
almost at our gates. The ladie of Sir Jocelyn had 
acquired an ill-fame during her widowhood, for 
she was greedy of other people's goods and avari- 
cious of her own, faithless unto her friends, merci- 
less to her foes, and to her vassals and serfs haughty 
and cruel, It was as much from the darkness of 
her deeds as from her foreign and dark complexion, 
that she had gotten all through the country the 
name of The Dark Ladie. But she was rich, pass- 
ing rich, and aspiring, and allied with some of our 
greatest men, and Sir Ingelric had given up his 
whole soul to ambition and gold. This' unseemly 
matrimony was mainly brought about by the coun- 
tess, and there were others of the like sort, which 
all terminated in misery and woe, and in visible 
manifestations of God's wrath and vengeance. 

The Dark Ladie, who had done much mischief 
in the land in her widowed condition, became 
still more terrible as the wife of Sir Ingelric, and 
that lost knight became all the worse for his union 
with her. They crammed their castle at Speen 
with a most ungodly garrison, and with prisoners 
they kept and tortured for ransom. 

King Stephen being a close prisoner in the castle 
of Bristowe, and the Earl of Gloucester being well 
guarded in Rochester Castle, each of the contending 
parties was, in a manner, without a head, for Ste- 
phen's brother, the bishop-legate, was, after all, 
but a priest, and the woman Matilda was nothing 
without her half-brother. A negociation was there- 
fore set on foot for a mutual release of prisoners. 
This was several times interrupted, and at each in- 
terruption the party of King Stephen threatened to 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 115 

send the Earl of Gloucester out of the land unto 
Boulogne, there to be buried in a castle-prison 
deep under the ground, and the party of Matilda 
threatened to send King Stephen over to Ireland 
and consign him to the wild Irishry ; but at last, 
on the first of the kalends of November, it was 
agreed between them that the great Earl of Glou- 
cester should be exchanged for King Stephen ; and 
the earl and the king being both liberated, each 
betook himself to the head-quarters of his friends 
and partisans. Both factions now stood much as 
they did previously to the battle of Lincoln ; but 
fearfully had the people of England suffered in the 
interim. And yet, after all these sufferings, neither 
faction did turn its thoughts ad regnum tranquil- 
landum ; but both did prepare for more battles and 
sieges, sending forth their bands of foreigners and 
leaving the cruel castle-holders to seize, torture, 
plunder and kill. While the land was thus weeping 
tears of blood, the king and his brother, the bishop, 
made repair unto London, where the king had his 
best friends, and where the legate did summon a 
great ecclesiastical council to meet at Westminster 
on the 7th of the kalends of December, ad pacem 
componendani) for the composing of peace unto the 
church and kingdom. When this council met on 
the appointed day, which was in the octaves of 
Saint Andrew, King Stephen addressed the pre- 
lates: he mildly and briefly complained of the 
wrongs and hardships he had suffered from his 
vassals, unto whom he had never denied justice 
when asked for it ; he said that if it would please 
the nobles and bishops of the realm to aid him with 
men and money, he trusted so to work as to relieve 
them from the fear of a shameful submission to the 



116 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

yoke of a woman, and so to succeed in his enter- 
prises as to put an end to intestine war and havoc, 
and establish his throne in peace. When the king 
had done speaking, the legate his brother, who only 
nine months before had in the synod held at Win- 
chester declared for Matilda, rose and proclaimed 
that the pope had ordered him to release and restore 
his brother, that Matilda had observed nothing of 
what she had sworn to him ; that the great barons 
of England had performed their engagements to- 
wards her, and that she, not knowing how to use 
her prosperity with moderation, had violated all 
her engagements and oaths ; that she had even made 
attempts against his, the legate's, liberty and life ; 
and that this freed him from the obligations of the 
oaths he had taken to the Countess of Anjou, for 
he would not longer call her queen. The legate 
further said that the judgment of Heaven was 
visible in the prompt punishment of her perfidy, 
and that God himself now restored his brother the 
rightful King Stephen to the throne. Albeit there 
were some among them who had but lately quit- 
ted the party of Matilda, the prelates and great 
men at Westminster assembled did agree that all 
loyal men ought forthwith to arm for King Stephen, 
and that the adherents of the countess should be 
everywhere stripped of their usurped authority, 
whether in church or civil government ; that forced 
elections should be all annulled, and that sentence 
of excommunication should go forth against all the 
obstinate and irreclaimable partisans of the coun- 
tess. And the Bishop of Winchester, as legatus a 
latere, did stand up with a new bull of the pope in 
his right hand, and pronounced the dread sentence 
against all such as should disturb the peace in 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 117 

favour of the Countess of Anjou, or should build new 
castles in the land, or invade the rights and privileges 
of the church, or wrong the poor and defenceless. 

Judge ye if the news of these high proceedings 
at Westminster did not bring with them joy and 
comfort unto the friends of the late Lord Abbot 
Edward and all the honest monks of Heading 
abbey ! Besides the sin and shame of his forced 
election, we had suffered many things at the hands 
of Anselm during the few months that he had held 
rule over us. In all that time he had kept the 
stout-hearted prior Eeginald in the prison under- 
ground, and had maliciously devised penances and 
punishments for all such members of the com- 
munity as had pitied the prisoner. He had alien- 
ated and sold some of the abbey lands to furnish 
out men-at-arms for his countess. He had half- 
starved the brotherhood, and no hospitality had he 
exercised unto strangers except to some Angevin 
marauders ; and when he went away to see the 
countess, which more than once he did, he left in 
the abbey some of these outlandish men to keep us 
in submission and dread. But now his evil reign 
was over, for so soon as they had learned what had 
passed at Westminster, and had gotten a rescript 
from the legate, the elders of our house took 
counsel together and resolved to liberate Eeginald 
the prior, and offer him the mitre, and to throw 
Father Anselm into the prison instead of the prior. 
And the thing was easy to do, for by this time 
Anselm had given offence to every cloister monk, 
novice, and lay -brother, and the warier sort did all 
opine that now that King Stephen was liberated, 
and his enemies excommunicated by the legate, the 
cause of the countess must be altogether desperate. 



118 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

And so with one voice and one will Anselra was 
seized and thrown into the underground cell, and 
the prior was brought forth, and conducted in 
triumph to the abbat's house, and there told that 
he must be our lord abbat. Most true it was that 
he had never wished for this post of eminence, 
and now prayed the brotherhood to elect the 
chamberlain or the sacrist or any experienced 
cloister-monk rather than him ; but the universal 
will and voice of the community would not be 
gainsayed, and in the course of a few days the 
prior was unanimously elected, by those who had 
the right of voting in the Chapter, to be our abbat ; 
and then we all carried him into the church in 
procession, sang Te JDeum laudamus, with loud 
and jubilant voices, rang the bells until they well 
nigh cracked, and set him on the abbat's throne, 
and did him all the homage that is due unto the 
mitred abbat of a royal abbey ; and then brought 
up Father Anselm, and drove him out of our gates 
with many kicks behind, for our new lord abbat 
would not have him linger and pine in that cold 
dark cell underground, saying that he knew to his 
cost how sad a thing it was, and that to hold any 
captive therein would be to make the wholesome 
air of the house infaust and insalubrious. 

As he was crossing the Holy Brook the townfolk 
of Reading, who no more loved Anselm than did 
we the monks, caught him by the girdle and threw 
him into the stream, so that he was nearly drowned 
at the place where he had forced us against our 
conscience to psalmodize for Matilda. He took 
these things so much to heart that he got him back 
into Normandie. It was said by some that he 
falsified his history and his very name, -and so 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 119 

gained admission into the abbey of Bee, but from 
the volatile nature of the man, I did rather give my 
belief to another report — to wit, that he turned 
himself into a jongleur or trouv ere, and went about 
France with women and menestrels and other lewd 
people. 

Sundry times he promised, and did in his heart 
intend, to visit our house, and force the restitution 
of the lands which the usurping Anselm had alien- 
ated to ungodly men ; yet King Stephen came not 
to Reading for many a year, and when he came he 
could not tarry with us. But the king sent Sir 
Alain de Bohun to build up and restore the ruinous 
castle of Reading ; and when this had been done, 
and when, by the vassals and serfs of the abbey, the 
walls of the township had been strengthened, we 
entered upon the enjoyment of such peace and 
tranquillity as we had not known during five long 
years ; for the Philistines could not come suddenly 
upon us, or easily break through our defences. 
At Reading, indeed, we did live as in a little 
Goshen, while war was raging all round about ; 
and albeit we could not always defend our out- 
lying manors and houses from fire and sword, but 
suffered many and grievous losses in serfs, cattle, 
corn, hay, farm-houses, and granges ; we yet suf- 
fered less than other communities, and nothing at 
all in comparison with the abbat and monks of 
Abingdon, our neighbours, but not always friends. 
Driven from their once quiet seat at Oxenford, or 
too sorely troubled in their residence there by the 
people of the countess, and the constant coming 
and going of warlike and plundering bands, many 
of the professors and pupils, doctores et alumni, 
did come unto Reading, and under the shadow of 



120 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

our secure and peaceful walls, pursue those studies 
which were destined to give to England a learned 
priesthood and a universal increase of civility. Our 
brotherhood too did attend to that learning and to 
the making of many good books which had done 
honour to the Benedictines ever since their first 
foundation and in whatsoever country their order 
was established. Our scribes and copyists once more 
worked amain in their quiet cells, multiplying with 
a slow but correct pen the precious works of an- 
tiquity, and the holy books, and the lives of saints ; 
and need there was for this labour, since other re- 
ligious houses had no peace or leisure, and great 
and fearful was the destruction of books and codices 
in the conflagrations and stormings of this long in- 
testine war. But for the labours of the Bene- 
dictines and some few learned monks of other 
orders in England, and but for the blessed saints, 
who kept alive their love of letters and books, and 
gave them heart and strength to work even in a 
season of horror and despair, the land would have 
been plunged back into utter barbarism, and would 
have been void of learning and of books as when 
the great Alfred came to the throne. In the tran- 
quil easy days in which I now write, for the solace 
of my lonely hours and for the preservation of the 
fading memory of the times of trouble, and for no 
fame or vain glory, the sense of these things hath 
already become faint in men's minds, and mayhap, 
in after ages, when the world shall have made great 
strides in learning and all civility, these labours of 
the Benedictines will be altogether forgotten, or be 
treated as nought. Yet was it they that did mainly 
save the land from a great retrograde step ; and I, 
Felix, servus servorum, the humblest or least 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 121 

worthy member of the order | who have so often 
mm shining in our western turret the midnight 
lamp which lighted our copyists and makers of 
books at their solitary labours, and who have st^en 
those labours steadily pursued when the country 
was ringing with the din of arms, and was blazing 
with midnight fires, ami when no earthly honour 
or reward whatsoever seemed to attend their toil), 
would fain put upon record some faint notice of 
that which was done in the evil times by our house 
and order : but not unto us the praise, but unto thee, 
oh Lord ! They, themselves, sought for no ap- 
plause — Celcita virtus — their virtue is all hidden : 
not so much as the name is preserved of these good 
and laborious monks who did so much for learning 
and religion. 

It was about the time in which Sir Alain de 
Bohun did re-edify Reading Castle, that I, Felix. 
recovering from my early podagra, under the in- 
struction and guidance of old father Ambrosiu- 
(he hath now been many years at rest in the 
chancel of our church, and I in gratitude do say 
a daily prayer over his grave), did first addict 
myself to the use of the pen, beginning with a 
missal, which our Pisan limner did richly illumi- 
nate ; and when this my first essay was finished, I 
did present it unto the Ladie Alfgiva in her house 
at Caversham, and that bountiful and right noble 
ladie did acknowledge the gift by sending unto the 
abbey five milch cows and a goodly stock of Caen 
fowls, which our community at that time much 
needed, for there had been a murrain among cattle, 
and the spoilers had again swept bare our best 
farms. 

Many were the tears shed by me, and many the 



122 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

masses and prayers said by our house for the said 
Ladie Alfgiva and the two missing children. 
Grief and anxiety for her son and foster daughter 
did at times almost bow that noble dame to the 
earth, and her grief was the greater because of 
her frequent loneliness and the hazards her lord 
was running in the many sieges and battles of the 
times ; but although her health declined and her 
cheek became wan, hope and trust in heaven's 
goodness did not forsake her. A pious dame was 
Ladie Alfgiva, and of a nature high and noble in 
all things. Though thinking day and night of her 
only son and her only living child, she never once 
implored Sir Alain to purchase the boy's release 
and his restoration to her arms by proving false to 
his oath and untrue to the king, and every time 
that her lord came to his home she dried her tears 
and did all that she could to conceal her great 
grief so long as he tarried with her. The virtuous 
woman is a crown unto her husband, and verily 
there be wives as well as virgins that merit the 
crown the church awards to saints and martyrs. 
Saint Catherine on the wheel, or Saint Agatha at 
the fiery stake, suffered not pangs so acute as those 
of this bereaved mother; and their torture was 
soon over, and while they suffered they saw from 
the wheel and stake the heavens opening to the 
eye, and they heard heavenly music in the air 
which made them deaf to the shouts of the infidel 
rabble that were slaying them. So much bliss 
and so great a foretaste of celestial joy was not 
vouchsafed unto the secular Ladie Alfgiva, and 
could not be expected by her : nevertheless had 
she her happy visions and sweet soothing sounds 
during her long bereavement. More than once, 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 123 

in her great loneliness, when her lord was away 
fighting for King Stephen, as she stood on the 
battlements of her castle at eventide, she saw her 
boy and his playmate Alice sitting on the flowery 
bank which slopes down to the river, as they used 
often to sit before Sir Ingelric did steal them 
away ; and she heard their merry little voices on 
the breeze, and their frolicsome laugh. Some 
would say that she but took two stray lambs for 
the lost children, and that the sounds she heard 
were only made by the evening breeze among the 
tall growing grass and the leafy coppices ; but I, 
Felix, could never so interpret it unto her. But 
constantly did I strive to give her comfort, 
and to conceal from her the cruelties that were 
daily committed in the land, and to stop the 
thoughtless indiscreet tongue of her people who 
would have filled her ears with horrible tales of 
murdered children and babes, for not the massacre 
of the Innocents in Judea was so fierce as the 
slaughter that raged in England. 



( 124 ) 



VII. 



When our good lord abbat Edward had been 
dead well nigh a year, to wit, in the summer 
season of eleven hundred and forty -two, King- 
Stephen, from great fatigue of body and uneasiness 
of mind, fell sore sick, and lay for a long while 
like one that was dying. While this lasted the 
barons of his party did many evil deeds, there 
being no authority strong enough to check their 
lawlessness ; and, at the same troublous season, 
the partisans of Matilda and the foreign merce- 
naries in her pay did ravage all the western parts ; 
and more robbers came over from Anjou, Nor- 
mandie, and Picardie, asking no pay, but only free 
quarters, and the right of plundering the poor 
English. It was a Benedictine from Rome that 
had studied medicine in the school of Salerno, that 
brought a healing potion to the king, and snatched 
him back to life from the jaws of the grave. 

So soon as Stephen could mount his war-horse 
he marched with a great force unto Oxenford, 
where the countess had fixed her court ; and he 
invested that unhappy city with a firm resolution 
never to move thence until he had gotten his 
troublesome rival into his hands. After some 
fighting, in which many lives were lost by both 
parties, Stephen burst into the town, and having 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 125 

tire to a large part (hereof, be laid siege unto 
the castle into which Matilda and her people had 
retired. Now the castle of Oxenford, standing in 

midst of water-, was very strong. From 
Michael's mass well nigh unto Christ's mam, 

(id natali Domini^ did King 
Stephen persevere in the siege, telling all men 
that complained of the hard service that he must 
have the castle, and in it the countess, and that 

then there would be peace in England. 

In the mid siege, our new lord abbat, who had 
had much correspondence with the lord abbat of 

Abingdon, with the prior and monks at Hurley, 

and with other Benedictine houses, for the g 

purpose of saving the remnant of t\m Christian 
people in those part-, and putting an end to the 

cruelties and many deadly sins which were daily 
committed, received from the Abingdon cell at 

Cumnor, nigh unto Oxenford, a missive from the 
abbat of that community, who entreated him, now 

that the country was char of Matilda's people, to 

repair unto Cumnor that they might take council 
together, and together confer with King Stephen, 
who seemed at that moment to be in a heavenly 
disposition, and to have an exceeding great desire 
to tranquillize the land, and to consult with the 
loyal abbat of Reading. Now albeit Stephen had, 
by means of Sir Alain de Bohun, e his 

great contentment at the expulsion of Father 
Anselm, and at all that had been done by our 
community since the great meeting of the synod 
at Westminster, the election of the prior to be our 
lord abbat had not yet been formally confirmed by 
the king ; and therefore Dominus Reginaldus did 
make haste to accept the invitation of the abbat of 

G 



126 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Abingdon, and to get him unto Cumnor. Not for 
any merit of mine own, but through the kind 
favour he was ever pleased to show me, I was 
chosen to be of the travelling party. Philip the 
lay-brother went likewise ; but Philip was a brave 
and ready man, quick-witted, and well-trained 
aforetime in the use of arms, and in the riding of 
the great horse. Although the nerve of the 
Angevin faction was shut up in Oxenford Castle, 
my Lord Reginald was too wise a man to put 
himself on the road with a weak escort ; for he well 
knew that there were many barons and knights, 
calling themselves King Stephen's friends and the 
friends of mother church, that would not scruple 
to plunder an abbat, or to keep him in their 
donjons for the sake of a great ransom ; and well 
nigh every castle between Reading and Oxenford, 
and between Oxenford and Bristowe, was a den of 
thieves, and worse ; and Lord Reginald had not 
lost his bellicose humour by being promoted to the 
highest dignity. " By the head of Saint John the 
Baptist," said he, as we were about to take our 
departure, " not a robber of them all shall lay me 
in his crucet house without having a hard fight for 
it ! Before I bear the weight of their sachenteges, 
I will make them taste the sharpness of my lance, 
and the weight of my mace." And so was it that 
we went forth from Reading forty and one strong, 
and every man of us armed cap-a-pie, and most of 
us well mounted. The lord abbat wore a steel 
cap under his hood, and a coat of mail and steel 
hose under his robes ; and he had a two-edged 
sword at his side and a heavy mace at the pommel 
of his saddle, and a good lance resting on stirrup- 
iron ; yea, and I, Felix the novice, wore ringed 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 127 

armour and a steel casque, and had my sword and 
lance : Englehard de Ofcomaoo, that Boned and 

well-jud^ine; knight, who was one of the retainer- 

of our abbey, doing military sendee for tin* abbey 

lands he heft near Hurley Common, did say that I 
looked a very proper man-at-arm-, and did bestride 
my steed like a knight — but these are vanities, 
and I by my vows did renounce all vanity. Yet 
can I but mark that when we canie to Cuinn* 
great baron asked who was that gallant well-fa- 
vored young soldier that rode in the van. near to 
the lord abbat of Reading. 

On our way we tarried for a night at B eteeo u rt 
by Pangbourne, where we had a goodly house 
among the hills which had wont to be a summer 
residence of our Abets. But this goodly house 
had been robbed and spoiled, and our \a-aK and 
serfs had not yet been enabled to restore ir. We 
were therefore roughly lodged and not over well 
fed; but that which atiected me more irrievously 
than this was the sad condition of the poor people 
of Pangbourne, who had been so prosperous and 
happy before these accursed wars began. Sad 
were the tales they told, and not the least sad of 
them all was this : my quondam friend and brother 
novice, Urswick the Whiteheaded, had been in the 
spring season of this year at Pangbourne with a 
great band of English and foreign robbers, ran- 
sacking the place of his birth and maltreating the 
friends among whom he had been born and bred ; 
and his aged father had to his face pronounced a 
curse upon him ; and in a quarrel with some savage 
men from Anjou touching the division of spoil, 
Urswick had been slain on the bank of Thamesis, 
before he could recross the river or get out of sight 

g2 



128 A LEGEND OF BEADING ABBEY. 

of his native village : and, since that black morn- 
ing, or so our serfs did say, his well-known voice 
had been heard at midnight, and he had been seen 
by the light of the moon, now habited as a monk, 
and wringing his hands by the river side where he 
fell, looking piteously towards the abbey of Read- 
ing, from which he had fled, and now equipped as 
a man-at-arms, and galloping on a great black 
horse, across the country and up the steep hills 
and down the precipices — fire flashing from the 
eyes and nostrils of the infernal steed, and from 
the burning heart of the lost novice. 

On our march from Pangbourne we shunned the 
townships and castles as much as we could, and 
took especial heed not to get near unto Walling- 
ford ; for the strong castle there was held by Brian 
Fitzcount, the most terrible of all Matilda's parti- 
sans, and the greatest robber of them all ; and the 
castle at this very time was known to be full of 
unfortunate prisoners whom he kept and daily tor- 
tured in order to make them disclose their sup- 
posed hidden treasures, or to pay a heavier ransom 
than any they had the means of paying. Christian 
burghers and franklins, noble knights who had 
warred against the heathen in Palestine, nay 
churchmen, the highest in the hierarchy, were 
known to be in his foul prison, pent up with Jew- 
ish traffickers and money-dealers ; the noblest and 
the purest with the vilest and foulest of the earth : 
and the gaolers and torturers of Brian Fitzcount 
treated the Christians no whit better than the 
Israelites that were chained at their sides, con- 
taminating them with their touch and poisoning 
the air they breathed. Night after night, such of 
the poor townfolk as had contrived to live in the 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 129 

midst of these horrors without deserting Walling- 
ford, were startled in their sleep by the cries and 
shrieks which came from the grim castle ; and 
when in the morning they adventured to ask 
what had been toward in the night watches, the 
Count's people would tell them jestingly from the 
battlements that it was nothing, or that Brian Fitz- 
count had only been coining a little more money, 
or that a Jew had had his teeth drawn, or that a 
traitor to the empress-queen had been questioned 
about his treason and treasure. 

The great prison in this castle of "Wallingford 
was called Brian's Hell, and it was deserving of 
the name. But the fiends were abroad, as well as 
within those abominable walls — the spirit of the 
arch-fiend was everywhere. The village churches 
and the chapels and hospitia in solitary places had 
been destroyed or turned into fortalices ; deep 
trenches were cut in the churchyards among the 
consecrated abodes of the dead ; the sweet sound- 
ing church bells had been thrown down, and en- 
gines of war had been set up on the church towers. 
Yea ! the resting places which the church and the 
piety of the faithful had built and stocked for the 
poor and hungry wayfarers in the desert had been 
plundered and destroyed — the last holy resting- 
places had been profaned ! The temple of peace 
and mercy had been turned into a place of arms! 

As we came near to Hanney mead and the river 
Ock — that pleasant little river that wells from the 
ground near Uffington and drops into Thamesis by 
Abingdon, and that has the most savoury pike that 
be fished in these parts — we came suddenly upon 
a castellum which we could by no means avoid ; 
for it had been lately built, and we knew not of 



130 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

it, and it lay so low among marshes that we saw it 
not until we were close upon it. It lay close to 
the only road that led to the ford across the river. 
To a trumpet which sounded a challenge from the 
walls our party replied with sound of trumpet, and 
then at the abbat's commandment proceeded delibe- 
rately onward. As we came nearer, the warder of 
the castle shouted " For whom be ye ?" 

" What if I say for King Stephen ?" quoth our 
lord abbat, rising in his stirrups and waving his 
lance over his head. 

" Long live King Stephen ! an thou wilt," said 
the warder, "but thou must pay toll ere thou 
mayest pass the river." 

" The lord abbat of Reading pays not even 
bridge toll, and here there is no bridge," said our 
lord abbat, " and fords be ever free. Go read 
our charter : In terris et aquis, in transitibus pon- 
tium, by land and by water, and in the passing of 
bridges, we be free from all tolls or consuetudinary 
payments. If thou wilt have toll from me, i'faith, 
thou must come forth and take it." 

" Thou art but a traitor," cried the warder. 
" Long live the empress -queen I" shouted divers 
armed men who ran to the battlement, and as they 
did shout did also bend their cross-bows. But by 
this time we had all put spurs to our horses, and 
we dashed past the ugly castellum and across the 
ford without receiving any hurt, albeit a quarrel 
did hit the lord abbat's steed near unto the tail and 
make him caper. Had our party been less nume- 
rous and warlike, doubtless we had been lodged 
that night among Brian Fitzcount's prisoners. 

The town and abbey of Abingdon we did also 
avoid, keeping a little to the westward thereof; for 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 131 

another tyrant and man destroyer bad built him- 
self a great castle in that vicinage, and there had 
been many feuds and factions and changing of sides 
among the monks of Abingdon, while the best and 
most trusty of that community were known to be 
at the house at Cumnor with their abbat. The 
roads were deep and miry, the way was long, the 
days were short, and the weather of the saddest ; 
but on the third evening after our departure from 
Beading we arrived at the Cell of Cumnor, where 
our lord abbat was hospitably received by the 
abbat of Abingdon, and where we of less note 
found good lodging and entertainment, to wit, a 
blazing wood fire whereat to dry our clothes, clean 
straw to sleep upon, and salted meats and manchets 
to eat, and good Oxenford ale to drink. 

On the morrow, when it wanted but two days of 
the feast of St. Thomas the Apostle, King Stephen 
with a few lords and knights rode from the be- 
leaguer of Oxenford Castle to Cumnor, and did 
there confer with the two abbats and other eccle- 
siastics. What passed in the council chamber I 
cannot tell ; but it was seen by all of us that the 
king wore a cheerful aspect, and it was told unto 
us all that the castle was reduced to extremity, 
and that, there being no escape thence, the countess 
must soon surrender or die of starvation. TThen 
the conference was over, and when the king had 
been entertained as royally as the abbat of Abing- 
don could do it in that place and at that time — and 
when Stephen had laid his offering upon the altar 
in the church, he rode back to the siege, and our 
lord abbat of Reading, and all of us who had come 
with him, attended the king to Oxenford, intend- 
ing there to tarry until the surrender of Matilda. 



182 A LEGEND OF READING ABBET. 

" With the saints to my aid," said our abbat, 
" I may prevail upon this perverse daughter of 
the Beauclerc to deliver herself quietly up, and 
upon King Stephen to be merciful unto her in her 
captivity. If the Angevin countess should still 
persevere in the wickedness of her ways, and attempt 
to escape again on a bier instead of putting an end 
to the woes of the land by a surrender, forty good 
swords the more may do service for the king. My 
children, my friends, ye will all be vigilant in this 
matter, and do duty like good soldiers, if it should 
be required of ye !" And as the good lord Regi- 
nald went into Oxenford town and saw the palace 
which the Beauclerc king had there builded, and 
saw the engines of war, and heard the horrid noise 
of war all about, he heaved a sigh and said, " Eheu J 
quantum mutatur ! How be all things changed ! 
Here in the days of Henricus Primus, that peace- 
loving king, JRex pacts, have I seen nothing but 
quiet scholars and learned men, and the court of a 
king that was an academe and a sanctuary of let- 
ters. Wot ye, my boy Felix, why it was that Hen- 
ricus did build him a palace here ?" And I hav- 
ing confessed my ignorance as became me, our 
abbat went on to say, " Felix, my son, the Beau- 
clerc had collected in his most royal park at 
Woodstock many wild beasts from foreign parts, 
such as lions and bears, leopards and lynxes, and 
porcupines, and of these he had a wonderful great 
liking, and here at Oxenford learned men were 
collecting every year in greater numbers, and in 
the company of these scholars his grace did take 
marvellous delight : in truth it were not easy to 
say whether he liked the beasts better than the 
bookish men, or the bookish men better than the 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 133 

beasts ; but, to have the enjoyment of both, he oft- 
times fixed his residence between them ; and there- 
fore was it, my son, that Henricus Primus raised 
this royal dwelling, and preferred it above his 
other houses." That very night, albeit I knew it 
not then, there came to King Stephen the very 
unfavourable news that the countess's half-brother, 
the great Earl of Gloucester, who for some months 
had been absent, had returned into England with 
a great body of Angevin and Norman troops, and 
had brought with him Henry Fitz-empress, Ma- 
tilda's young son and heir, had stormed and taken 
the castle of Wareham, had been joined by many 
traitorous barons who had but lately given fresh 
oaths of fidelity to Stephen, and was marching 
through the land to relieve his sister in Oxenford 
Castle and fall upon her besiegers. Maugre the 
pains that were taken to conceal this intelligence, 
it got abroad, and was by some double-dealer con- 
veyed to Matilda within the castle. 

That night there fell a great fall of snow, and 
after the snow r a sharp and most sudden frost did 
set in, which in less than twenty -four hours did 
cover the river Isis and the moat of the castle and 
the circumjacent marshes with thick ice. The 
beleaguerers made themselves great fires, and 
seemed not to remit in their watchfulness. I, Fe- 
lix, with Philip the lay-brother, and Sir Englehard 
de Cicomaco, did mount guard and stand wakeful 
all that bitter night, opposite to a postern gate of 
the castle. From time to time some great officer 
of King Stephen went from watch to watch, and 
all round the lines to see that the people did their 
duty and slept not. Joy came to my heart, and 
the deadening cold seemed to quit my body, when 

g3 



134 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

I saw Sir Alain de Bohun come to the place where 
I stood. 

" Watch well to-night, oh Felix," said that 
brave and always courteous lord ; " watch well to- 
night, and to-morrow will we have our enemy in 
our hands—and dear friends, too. Felix ! I have 
had assurance that my son and thy little friend is 
within those walls ! To-morrow Matilda must 
yield ; so watch well that postern." 

I kissed Sir Alain's hand, and vowed that not so 
much as a famished cat or rat should come forth of 
that gate, nor did there while my watch lasted. 

On the next day, the vigil of St. Thomas, as 
soon as it was light, a white flag was raised in the 
camp in token of peace or truce, and our lord 
abbat, with a goodly train of ecclesiastics, bearing 
church banners and elevated crucifixes, came down 
to the very edge of the castle moat, and demanded 
speech of the countess ; and Matilda ascended to 
the battlements, but rather to rebuke them than to 
hear them. I, Felix, being relieved from my night 
watch, did see that stern woman of many adven- 
tures and indomitable pride stand on the castle top 
in that cold, grey, leaden air. Thin was she, and 
gaunt and pale, like one that had suffered long 
fasting and sickness ; but she had the same flashing 
eye and resolute look as at the time when she dic- 
tated her will to our house at Reading ; and if her 
voice was more hollow, it was not less imperious 
and awe-commanding now than it was then. The 
lord abbat entreated her to give up the castle, pro- 
mising, in the name of King Stephen, that no harm 
should be done to her or to any that were with her ; 
that she should be honorably escorted to the coast, 
and there embarked for Anjou ; that lands and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 135 

money should be given to her and her adherents 
with a liberal hand ; and that the king- would take 
all her partisans into his peace, if they would but 
be true to treaty, and give up a war which had 
already lasted so many years to the reproach of 
Christendom, and to the utter undoing of the people 
of England. The abbat told her that her famish- 
ing state was known, and that hope of escape there 
was none. 

" And who told thee, oh meddling monk, that I 
ever thought of escape? Dost not know that the 
Earl of Gloucester is at hand, to do the thing which 
he did aforetime at Lincoln ? We have meat and 
meal yet, and will abide the earl's coming. I will 
not throw open these gates, or quit these walls, 
until I see the false recreant Stephen in chains at 
my feet, praying again for that life which I ought 
to have rid him of long since." 

As the proud woman said these words, I could 
see that many of our bystanders looked at one 
another with perplexity and alarm, and that divers 
even of the churchmen put on very thoughtful 
countenances, and did nothing and said nothing to 
aid our lord abbat, or to rebuke the countess, who 
in a great passion of wrath threatened to have him 
hanged for a felon under the archway of his own 
abbey. 

Some there were that would have counselled an 
immediate assault upon the fortress ; for albeit no 
breach had been made in those formidable walls, 
the moat was so frozen that it would bear any 
weight, and scaling ladders and other needful ma- 
terials were not wanting. But the more cautious 
sort said that the famishing garrison were very 
numerous and very desperate; that it would be 



136 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

better to wait a day or two, and have the castle 
upon composition ; that the Earl of Gloucester had 
yet sundry days of march to perform ; and that if 
he came with ever so great a host, he would find it 
no easy work to break through our barricades and 
defences, and get into the town. Some of the 
churchmen, moreover, did say that no enterprise 
of war would prosper during the festivals of the 
church ; and, certes, the major part of King Ste- 
phen's soldiers did seem fully determined to keep 
this the vigil, and to-morrow the festival of St. 
Thomas the Apostle, according to the rubric, whe- 
ther the king would have it so or not. Hence there 
was a very visible relaxation of vigilance. Re- 
freshed by a short sleep in the day, I did watch 
again that night with the beleaguerers ; but my 
post was not where it had been the night before, 
and in the morning, before I could be relieved, I 
learned that the countess had escaped through the 
postern which I had watched so well. Marvellous, 
truly, was the skill and fortune of the Beauclerc's 
daughter ! She had escaped from Devizes by putting 
on the semblance and trappings of the dead, and 
now she had escaped from Oxenford like a sheeted 
ghost ! A little after the midnight hour she had 
dressed herself all in white, and had thrown white 
sheets over Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, and three 
others of her knights ; and she and these four 
sheeted warriors had stolen out of the castle by the 
postern gate, and had crossed the moat on the ice 
and traversed the ice-bound Isis, and creeping on 
their hands and knees over the deep white snow, 
they had escaped detection, and got safely through 
our lines and all our outposts. On foot, in the 
deep snow, Matilda with her attendant spectres tra- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 137 

veiled to Abingdon ; but there they found friends 
and horses, for the news of the coming of the Earl 
of Gloucester had reached the place, and had been 
very fatal to men's loyalty unto Stephen. From 
Abingdon, without resting there, the countess rode 
through that cold night to Wallingford Castle, 
where Brian Fitzcount received her very joyfully. 
But these things came to my knowledge afterwards ; 
and when it was first heard that the countess was 
gone, none could tell how she was gone, or whither 
she had betaken herself. The notice was not given 
until more than seven hours after her departure, 
when, as the day began to dawn, a starving man- 
at-arms cried out from the battlements that the 
garnison were ready to throw open the gates unto 
King Stephen, and so save themselves from death 
by hunger, as the queen had fled thence, and was 
no longer in any clanger. At first the news was 
not credited by any of the king's people ; but soon 
the governor of the castle sounded trumpets for a 
parley, and held out a flag of truce, and offered to 
deliver up the castle upon condition that his life 
and the lives of his people should be spared. King 
Stephen himself came rushing to the post opposite 
the castle gate to learn the truth, and settle the 
conditions of surrender ; and with him came Sir 
Alain de Bohun, mortified yet rejoiced, a much 
perplexed yet a happy man ; for though it should 
be found that the scourge of England had escaped, 
he had a confident hope that she could not have 
carried away his son with her. 

King Stephen spoke aloud to the castellan, and 
said, " This is but a fabulous rumour ! The countess 
of Anjou is where she hath been these last three 
months ! Unsay what hath been said ! Tell me 



138 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

that she is within those walls, and, starving as thou 
art, I will give thee more than the conditions thou 
ask est — I will give thee wealth and honours^ Only 
say that she hath not escaped." 

" Earl of Moriton and Boulogne !" shouted the 
proud castellan, " if the empress queen were within 
these walls I would starve and die, but never open 
these gates unto thee ! Let mine offer to surrender 
be a proof that she is gone hence. I swear, by the 
holy rood, that she hath been gone ever since mid- 
night." 

" Whither hath she gone ?" cried Stephen. 

" I know not, and would not tell thee if I did 
know ; but 'tis likely she will soon tell thee where 
she is." 

While the castellan was talking in this guise on 
the outer walls, many of our lords and knights, with 
their men-at-arms, got them to horse, and, dividing 
into different parties, went scouring over the 
country in all directions, some along the road that 
leads to Woodstock, some on the Abingdon road, 
some down the river towards Newnham, some 
towards Forest Hill, and some across the hills 
towards Islip and Weston-on-Green. 

Many slips and falls had they on the frozen ice 
and slippery roads ; yet was it all but a bootless 
chace. The party that went along the Abingdon 
road, and that came back even faster than they 
went, as Sir Brian Fitzcount had advanced a body 
of horse to the township of Abingdon, had met on 
their advance an aged shepherd who had been out 
in the night in search of some sheep that had 
been lost in the snow drifts ; and this aged man 
had told them that about the midnight hour he had 
seen gliding along the road between Oxenford and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 139 

Abingdon five ghosts or revenants all in white, 
which he took to be the uneasy spirits of some who 
had perished in our diurnal slaughters ; and this 
was all that was learned by our too late pursuing 
companies. 

In the first heat of his wrath and bitterness of 
his disappointment the king refused to admit the 
garnison to capitulation, and threatened to hang 
them all, together with many of his own watch ; 
but our lord abbat moderated his wrath. Sir Alain 
de Bohun, eager for sight of his boy, and always 
averse to bloodshed, did recommend mercy and 
moderation ; and so, about mid-day, terms .'were 
granted, and the castle was given up to Stephen. 
I was among the first that entered with our good 
Lord of Caversham. Sir Alain found many friends 
among those who had been kept as prisoners by 
the Countess ; but for some time he could not find 
his son, or hear anything concerning him, save that 
the boy had been seen in the castle a few days 
agone. Fearful thoughts agitated the loving 
father, and made him turn ghastly pale. Had the 
Countess in her rough nocturnal flight carried the 
boy with her? No, there was a knight who 
opened the postern-gate for her, and who swore 
upon his cross that none had gone forth but the 
empress-queen, Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, and 
the three other knights. Had the desperate woman 
in her fury against one of the most constant of her 
enemies taken the life of the dear boy ? None 
would confess to the atrocious deed, yet none 
seemed to know what had befallen Sir Alain's son. 
In truth they were all ravenous and stupified with 
their excess of hunger, and were only eager to get 
out into the town, and at the meat and drink which 



140 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

had been mercifully promised them ; and for many 
a day few of them had taken any note of what was 
doing within the castle or in the lodging of Ma- 
tilda. But the Lord of Caversham and the best 
of his own people, and I, Felix, and Philip, the 
lay-brother, did rush into the apartment of the 
Countess and ransack it well ; and while we were 
in an inner room in the tower that looks upon 
Isis, we heard a feeble voice as of one lamenting, 
and pulling aside some hangings on the wall, we 
discovered a small low door under an arch, and 
thereupon Sir Alain, all of a tremble, cried out in 
a voice that went unto the hearts of all of us, 
" Who lieth within? Is it thou, mine only son?" 
and the faint voice said " My father," and said no 
more. The iron-bound door was locked, and the 
key was gone ; but spite of its thickness and 
strength, we soon burst the door open with a 
mighty crash. I did enter that foul hole in the 
wall with Sir Alain, and did see and hear that 
which passed when he raised his boy from the dirty 
straw upon which he had fainted ; but I have not 
the power to narrate that which I saw and heard. 
JNay, to speak more soothly, I did see but faintly, 
.for the light that came into the cell through a 
narrow loophole was but scant, and my gushing 
tears did almost blind me. But we soon carried 
the boy out into wholesome air, and put wine to 
his lips ; and he recovered and knew his father. 
And when he had eaten and gained strength, he told 
his sire, who had never before been seen so wrath- 
ful, that he had not tasted meat or drink for two 
whole days and nights. Verily it did seem that 
the Countess had destined him to die of starvation, 
and that she had herself secreted him in that 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEF. 141 

hideous hole in the castle- wall, for none of her 
attendants would confess any knowledge of the 
thing. But Sir Alain would not give credit to 
these protestations of ignorance, saying that some 
of the Countess's people must have known what 
was done in her own apartment, and sorely did he 
beat with the flat of his sword an old foreign hag 
that had been the Countess's chamber-woman, and 
two Angevins that had been in constant attendance 
upon her ; and he swore more oaths than had ever 
come from his lips, that were it not for the love of 
the king his master, and for the king's honour, and 
for his own religious respect for compacts and 
treaties and capitulations of war, he would hang 
them all three on the top of that accursed tower. 

So soon as I saw that the hope of the house of 
Caversham was restored to some of his strength 
(and he gave me a proof thereof by saluting me 
and taking me by the hand as an old friend), I 
went forth to try if I could gain some intelligence 
of the little Alice, who was not born to live se- 
parated from Arthur, and likewise of my whilom 
friend and companion John-a-Blount from Maple- 
Durham, who had fled from our house at Heading 
with the novice Urswick, of unhappy memory. I 
soon learned from some retainers of Sir lngelric of 
Huntercombe that the little maiden, before the 
coming of King Stephen to Oxenford, had been 
bestowed with her step-mother in the strong castle 
at Old Speen, which Sir lngelric had rebuilded ; 
but the fellows knew not, or pretended not to know, 
anything touching our fugitive novice John-a- 
Blount. Therefore did I put my soul and body in 
peril by going into the very midst of the Countess 
Matilda's black-eyed damsels ; for I thought in the 



142 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

nature of things that he should be among those 
young Jezebels who had first led him astray. Al- 
beit the merciful terms of capitulation were faith- 
fully observed, and knights of good repute were 
stationed in the castle to see that no harm was done 
to those that had surrendered ; the interior of the 
fortress was still a scene of unspeakable confusion 
and alarm. Fierce knights that had not prayed 
for many a day, and rough outlandish soldiers who 
knew not how to say a credo or an ave, were mut- 
tering orisons and telling their beads, or holding 
their crucifixes in their hands, crying ever and 
anon to the more truculent visaged of the king's 
people, " We have all rendered upon paction — We 
be all in the king's mercy and honour — Touch 
not our lives or limbs, or eyes, but give us to eat, 
or we perish !" 

The women of the countess, whose eyes were 
much less bright and dangerous than when I last 
saw them in their pride and insolency at our abbey, 
lay all huddled and crouching together in a corner 
of the castle-yard, where divers clerks of Oxenford, 
with the marshal of King Stephen's camp, were 
making lists of the names and qualities of the pri- 
soners. Many men, as well English as foreign, 
were standing near these affrighted and more than 
half-famished women ; and a few young knights 
and esquires seemed to be speaking words of com- 
fort to divers of them ; but among these men I 
could not see John-a-Blount, from Maple- Durham, 
nor any young man that resembled him ; and when 
I asked of many, they all told me that they knew 
nothing of the said John: which was grievous 
unto my soul, for I had hoped to find him there, 
and to reclaim him, and thereby save him from the 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 143 

fate of the unhappy Urswick. As I was about to 
turn from that company of women, I was brought 
to a pause by a pair of eyes, swimming in tears, that 
did bind me to the spot, like one spell-bound. 
They were the large black eyes of that damsel in 
the short green kirtle, and of the incomparably 
small feet and ankles that had come salting and 
dancing up to me in the garden of our house at 
Reading; but alack, she danced not now, and 
seemed scarcely able to stand, and instead of the 
laughingest she had the saddest face ; and she was 
all thin and haggard as the poorest of the wander- 
ing houseless beggars we had met on our march 
from Reading to Oxenford. I had the remnant of 
a manchet in the sleeve of my monastic gown, and 
though many eyes were upon me, and others might 
be as hungry as she was, I took forth the blessed 
piece of bread, and thrust it into her skinny hands, 
and then hurried away to Sir Alain de Bohun, who 
did forthwith order some meat and drink to be 
given to those poor outlandish starvelings. 

On the day next after the surrender of the castle, 
the foreign women — praise and thanks to the Lord 
for that same ! — were all sent away under a strong 
and reliable escort for the city of London, there to 
be kept by Stephen's good queen Maud until they 
should be ransomed or exchanged for other pri- 
soners. And in the current of that same day we 
did hear but too surely what the escaped countess 
was a-doing. She had gone forth from Walling- 
ford Castle with Brian Fitzcount and a great host 
of foreign mercenaries, and was marching to the 
westward to meet the Earl of Gloucester, who was 
not so near to Oxenford as had been reported, and 
she was again marking her evil path with blood 



144 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and flames. King Stephen resolved to follow her 
and bring the great earl to battle ; but the countess 
and her half-brother having met in Wiltshire, re- 
treated rapidly to the west, where lay their great 
strength in partisans and castles, and they threw 
themselves into the castle of Bristowe, which was 
their strongest hold all through the war. The king 
would have turned back to lay siege to "VYallingford 
Castle, in the absence of its terrible lord the mer- 
ciless Brian Fitzcount ; but a plot broke out in the 
vicinage of London, and sundry barons raised the 
banner of Matilda in Essex, thereby obliging- 
Stephen to march with all speed to the eastward. 
So Wallingford Castle remained in the hands of 
the robbers, to be a curse to the country and a den 
of torture : but we, the monks of Reading, with 
little aid but what the saints sent us, and with no 
loss of life to our party, did prevail over another 
band of thieves and destroy their den, to the ines- 
timable relief and comfort of that country side. 



( 145 ) 



VIII. 



The day before King Stephen marched from Oxen- 
ford to pursue the countess, our lord abbat, who 
grieved to see that his brother of Abingdon was 
influenced by the changes of the times and by the 
rumour of the great force which the Earl of Glou- 
cester had brought with him, took his departure 
for his own abbey, and with us went Sir Alain de 
Bohun, who needs must restore his beloved son to 
his ladie and home ere he tried again the fortune of 
war or entered upon any new emprise. The lord of 
Caversham took with him a score of retainers, so 
that we were now sixty-two well-armed men. The 
young Lord Arthur sometimes rode before his 
father, and sometimes a maneged horse by himself, 
for the boy was now in his tenth year, and had 
been taught by times to do that which befits a 
knight. A proud and happy man I wis was Sir 
Alain as he looked upon his only son and thought 
of the great joy their return would give to the 
Ladie Alfgiva. Much also did I converse with 
the young Lord Arthur on the road, and he did 
tell me how much he had grieved when Sir In- 
gelric had carried away from him his little play- 
mate who had travelled with him so many days in 
horse litters, and who had abided with him in so 
many castles that he could not tell the names of 



146 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

half of them. A shrewd brave boy was the young 
Lord Arthur, and for his age marvellously ad- 
vanced in letters ; and I, Felix, had at times given 
him instruction before that Sir Ingelric did steal 
him away from his home so feloniously. Again, 
though through no fear, since our party was so 
strong and warlike, we shunned the townships and 
castles that lay near our road. Also did we choose 
another ford whereby to cross the river Ock with- 
out passing near the walls of that uncivil castellum 
that lay in the swamps ; for we were all anxious to 
be home and had no tools for trying a siege ; nay, 
had we not among us so much as a single scaling 
ladder. Yet when we came to our poor house at 
Pangbourne we heard that which did put us in 
heart to undertake the storming of a castle. It 
was dark night when we arrived there, and the day 
had been a day of heavy snow with rain, and I was 
sitting with a few others by the kitchen fire in the 
chimney nook drying myself, when a little boy of 
the village came in and tugged me by the sleeve, 
and said that there was one without who would 
speak with me. Such message liked me not, nor 
did the time of night, for I thought of Urswick 
and his hell -horse ; nevertheless I soon followed 
the boy to the house porch, and thereby I found a 
lonely man, sitting on a cold wet stone, with his 
face muffled, and his body bent to the earth like 
one sore afflicted. Started I not back with the 
thought that the form that I saw was but the 
spectrum of Urswick ! It spake not, nor did it 
move. I turned me round to grasp my conductor 
by the arm, but the boy was gone ; and I stood 
alone with that lone and dolorous figure which I 
could but faintly see, for there was no moon, and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 147 

the stars were overcast with black clouds, and 
verily my fears or my exceeding great awe did not 
aid my eyesight. But at last the figure rose from 
the cold stone and said, " Is it thou, oh Felix? Is 
it thou, my once friend ?" 

The voice was that of John-a-Blount from 
Maple-Durham ; and before I could say " It is even 
I," that erring novice clasped me by the hand and 
peered into my face, and turned me towards the 
faint uncertain light, and then fell upon my neck, 
and wept aloud. I led him farther from the 
house-door, and when he grew calmer I communed 
with him where none might overhear his words ; 
but I took not this step until he vowed to me that 
his soul was penitent, and that he had come unto 
Pangbourne only to do a good deed. He con- 
fessed unto me that the love of woman had been 
his undoing, that one of the countess's foreign 
damsels had practised upon him and bewitched him, 
and that he had done many deadly sins on her ac- 
count in battles and nightly surprisals, and the 
burning and storming of towns. But after a 
season the young cockatrice had scorned his love, 
and had told him that she must mate with a great 
lord, and not with a runagate shaveling, who had 
neither house nor lands : and at her own prayer 
her mistress, the Countess Matilda, had sent poor 
John-a-Blount away to serve with Sir Ingelric of 
Huntercombe, and Sir Ingelric had for a long 
time left him in his castle with a gang of robbers 
and cut-throats. 

" Oh, John-a-Blount !" said I, " these foreign 
women be worse than painted sepulchres. I 
doubt not that Urswick was entreated in like 
manner by his leman." 



148 A LEGEND OF HEADING ABBEY. 

" He was, and worse," quoth John ; " and it 
did drive him into a boiling madness, and into the 
doing of the most savage deeds." 

" Urswick had ever a wild heart and volage 
thoughts ; Urswick perished in his guilt," said I : 
" but thou are more fortunate in that thou livest 
to repent." 

" I know his fate," said John, " and may the 
saints now spare us the sight of him on his in- 
fernal steed ! By all the saints that preside over 
our house at Reading, I was penitent before ; but 
the tale of these nightly visitings of my comrade 
Urswick did complete my guerison, and make me 
resolve to do that which I have now come hither 
to propose." 

" What good and expiatory deed is that?" 

" The delivering up of Sir Ingelric's detestable 
castle," replied John-a-Blount. 

" That were a good deed if thou couldest do it." 

" I can," said John, " if a few will march 
thitherward with me ; for there be those within 
that will help me, captives that I can release from 
their chains, and unwilling vassals of Sir Ingelric. 
Dost comprehend me, Felix ?" 

I then asked whether the little Alice were safe 
within the castle, and whether Sir Ingelric's 
second wife were a mate worthy of such a husband, 
for fame reported her to be so, and it was hard to 
think well of one who had married the slayer of 
the husband of her youth. John gave me assu- 
rance that Alice was there, and harshly used 
by her step-mother, and that the said dame was 
well nigh as merciless and rapacious as her present 
lord, keeping prisoners in the donjon and putting 
them to the torture for their money. 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 149 

u But we lose time," said John ; " the deed in 
hand must be done to-night, or some within the 
hellish cavern will be racked to-morrow morning-. 
So lead me to the prior — to the new lord abbat I 
would say — that I may propound my plan unto 
him or unto Sir Alain de Bohun. When the 
deed shall be done they will throw me into the 
abbey prison ; but I am past caring for that, and 
have not long to live." 

I told him that our new abbat, the Lord Regi- 
nald, was the most indulgent of men, and Sir Alain 
the most generous, but he would not be comforted. 
While walking back to the porch of the Pang- 
bourne house I did inquire of him how he so well 
knew about our coming and our party ; and to this 
he made answer that Sir Ingelric's castellan, who 
had gotten by his stealthy movements and savage 
assaults the name of the Wolf, did constantly keep 
in his pay some wretched serfs who acted as scouts 
and spies, and ofttimes lured heedless men to their 
destruction. " Ye were watched," said John, " at 
your going unto Oxenford, and would have been 
attacked if you had not been so well provided ; 
and ye have been tracked and watched on the re- 
turn, and I, upon the report of those espials, and 
upon a feigned show of great zeal, have been sent 
hither by Sir Ingelric's fit mate to see whether an 
attack might not be made during the darkness of 
the night upon my lord abbat's horses and bag- 
gage.' , 

" May the foul fiend reward that same un- 
womanly ladie for the impious intention," said I. 

" He will," quoth John, " if the good lords will 
but take counsel of so lowly and miserable a man 
as I am." 



150 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

When we came near unto the porch, the heart 
of my sad companion failed him, and he said that 
he could not face the lord abbat so suddenly, and 
that it were better I went in to prepare the way 
for him. I had no suspicion of his penitence or 
his present good faith, but my short experience in 
w T ar had made me wary, and I called to some men- 
at-arms that were tending their horses in the stable,, 
and bade them look to the stranger. My lord 
abbat and Sir Alain were already at their supper r 
and savoury was the smell of the fried fish of 
Thamesis and the roasted meats that were spread 
on the table before them ; but before he heard half 
of that which I had to say, the abbat thrust aside 
his platter and gave thanks to Heaven as for the 
return of a prodigal son, and thanked the patron 
saints of our abbey for so good a prospect of de- 
stroying a nest of robbers ; and Sir Alain gave 
thanks for the same, and for so fair a hope of re- 
covering the gentle little Alice ; and the young- 
Lord Arthur, who was eating at a side table placed 
near the fire, started to his feet and said that he 
would go with sword and pike to break open the 
wicked castle and recover his playmate ; and they 
all three bade me hasten to the porch and bring in 
John-a-Blount. Many a hardened sinner would 
have been brought to repentance if he could but 
have seen in how kindly a manner the lord abbat 
received the penitent stray sheep of his flock. He 
raised John from the earth, he told him that hi; 
sins would be forgiven him, he bade him be of 
good cheer, and to put some little present cheer 
into the. haggard trembling young man he gave 
him a cup of wine in his own silver cup. Although 
he had been straitened by no siege and had under- 



A LEGEND OF BEADING ABBEY. 151 

gone no compulsory fast, the face of that black- 
I damsel that wore a green kirtle was not more 
changed than that of John-a-IUount : and 1 almost 
shuddered as I looked upon it m the bright tight 
of that room. The abbat and Sir Alain listened 
with eager attention to the unhappy youth ; and 
when they had heard him out his plan wase poo dily 
ed. He would hasten back to the foul dtm he 
had left, and tell Sir Ingehric'fl people that the 
weary travellers were buried in sleep, and that 
there was the fittest opportunity in the world for 
seizing their cattle and bag-gage, and bringing off a 
rich booty. The entire garrison of the castle 
barely two-score men. One half of these would 
sally to make the booty, and these might all be 
seized on their march by an ambuscade of my lord 
abbat's followers. Of those that would remain 
within the castle sundry were ready to revolt, and 
John-a-Blount would release the many prisoners, 
and slay the castellan, that ravenous wolf, in the 
den. 

" My son," said the abbat, as John was taking 
his hasty departure, " do what thou wilt with the 
"Wolf, but spare Sir Ingelric's wife." 

" And," said Sir Alain, u as thou vainest thine 
own life, or the future health of thy repentant soul, 
have a care of the little Alice in the affray." 

John laid his right hand upon his breast, and 
bowed lowly. Following him almost to the door 
of the room our kind-hearted lord abbat said, " Still 
there is one thought that doth spoil my present 
hope and joy : thou mayest fail in thine enterprise, 
and if thou art but suspected thou wilt be mur- 
thered by that bloody Wolf. Bethink thee, my son ! 
Peradventure it may be better that thou stayest in 

h 2 



152 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

safety where thou art, and that we leave this vile 
castellum to be reduced by regular siege at some 
future day." 

" My lord and father," said John, dropping on 
his knee, and kissing the abbat's hand, "should 
I die in the attempt to perform a good deed, thou 
wilt have prayers and masses said for me. But I 
shall not die to-night, and I see no chance of mis- 
carriage. I could wish that for me the danger 
were greater, that it might the better stand as an 
atonement for my many transgressions." 

" Go then, my son, and God speed thee ! And 
then will we ourselves shrieve thee, and absolve 
thee after some due penitence, and make thee 
sound in conscience, and heart-whole and happy 
again." 

John-a-Blount kissed the abbat's hand once 
more, and prayed the saints to bless him : but as he 
rushed out at the door we saw big tears in his eyes, 
and heard him mutter that he should never be 
happy again in this world. 

" That poor boy," quoth Sir Alain, " hath not 
yet forgotten the young syren that led him astray." 

" 'Tis witchcraft and sortilege, maleficium et 
sortilegium" said the abbat. " But by the help 
of our prayers and relics we will disenchant him." 

Sir Alain shook his head, but said no word. 

Forty men of us put on harness and followed in 
the track of John-a-Blount when he had been gone 
some short time. Sir Alain would have willed the 
lord abbat to tarry in the house with Arthur, but 
the abbat would on no account be left out of the 
adventure, saying, that his presence and exhorta- 
tions might spare unnecessary bloodshed ; yet while 
he was saying the words he was feeling the point 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 153- 

of his lance, and he took with him his heavy battle 
mace. We all journeyed on foot, for war horses 
would be but an incumbrance at Sir Ingelric'& 
castle, and by neighing or making other noise they 
might spoil our ambuscade on the road. That road 
was a very rough one, and the night continued 
rather dark ; hence divers of us stumbled, and fell 
more than once : nevertheless we kept up a good 
pace, and in little more than an hour came to a 
wooded hollow, about midway between Pangbourne 
and Speen, through which the robbers must pass 
on the way from their castle to our manor-house. 
The trees were all leafless and bare ; but the trunks 
of the ancient oaks were thick, and so every man of 
us got him behind an oak, twenty on this side the 
narrow road and twenty on that, and there we all 
stood concealed from view, and silent as grave 
stones. I, Felix, had a bad catarrh, yet did I 
neither cough nor sneeze all the while I was there, 
for I had prayed unto the saint that hath controul 
over coughs and colds. For a space that seemed 
to us very long we heard no sound, and in that 
wooded hollow and night-darkness we could see 
but a very little way. I began to think that the 
good strategem had miscarried, and to moan in- 
wardly for John-a-Blount as a murthered man. 
But at last we heard, not voices, for the ungodly 
Philistines were as silent as we, but the heavy- 
tread of footsteps on the broad heath, just above 
the hollow ; and these sounds rapidly came nearer ; 
and then, by peeping round the bole of my covering 
tree, I did faintly discern a score or more of dark 
figures descending in loose and careless array into 
the hollow. As we had been bidden, we all stood 
stock still until the robbers were at the bottom of 



154 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

the hollow, and between us ; but so soon as they 
were there as in a trap, Sir Alain shouted " Now 
for the onslaught in the name of King Stephen ! 
and our abbat shouted " Down, traitors, down !" 
and the valorous Lord of Caversham and our not 
less valorous lord abbat, and every man of us, from 
this side of the pathway and from that, sprung 
from behind the trees and hemmed in the evil- 
doers ; and in less time than I can say it the 
heavy mace of our lord abbat laid two of the rob- 
bers on the earth with bleeding pates, and Sir 
Alain's lance went through the body of one that 
seemed the leader, and pinned him to the very oak 
behind which I had been standing. The rest, after 
making vain effort to retreat the way they had 
come, laid down their arms and cried piteously for 
quarter and for that mercy which they had never 
shown to other men. There were a score of them 
besides the three that had gotten their death- 
warrants. We bound the score with the cords 
and thongs we had brought with us, and putting 
them in motion with the sharp heads of our lances, 
we proceeded rapidly to the foul donjon at Speen, 
our lord abbat saying that thus far was well, and 
some of our captives already beginning to say to 
Sir Alain that they would change banners and 
fight for King Stephen if his lordship would spare 
their lives and accept their services. The dark 
wintry clouds rolled away, and the stars shone out 
brightly as if in . approbation of our enterprise, 
and in no long while we did see that equable little 
river the Lambourne, which neither overflows in 
winter nor shrinks in summer, but is at all seasons 
the same (its pike be pale in colour, and in taste 
not to compare with those of Ock), gliding to join 



A LEGEND OF READING ABSEY. 155 

our own swift, sweet Kennet at the township of 
Shaw ; and we saw still clearer the swift Kennet 
gliding before us, on its way from Speen to our 
abbey walls at Reading and the broad Thamesis. 
And then, as we hurried on our way, and as the 
stars shone out with still more brightness, we dis- 
covered broken columns and fragments of walls, 
standing up from the ground like spectres on a 
heath ; and anon we heard the owls hooting to one 
another among these ancient ruins. And ancient 
in sooth they were, for the Romans in the days of 
the Caesars had built them a city at Spinas which 
men do now call Speen, and these dark and fantas- 
tically shaped fragments and ruins were all that 
remained of it ; for the men of Newbury, who have 
ever had a great envy to other townships and a 
great liking for the property of other men, had 
levelled most of the Roman walls and had carried 
away the stones and bricks thereof to enlarge their 
own town ; and people of other townships had 
helped themselves at Spinas as though it had been 
a common quarry. Such fate befalls towns in de- 
cay ; but such will never befall our glorious abbey 
at Reading, for the saints and angels have custody 
thereof, even as we have meetly expressed, in large 
letters graven upon the left door of our gate-house 
under the abbey arms, AKGELI TUI CUSTO- 
DIANT MUROS EJUS. But I wis it was not 
on this night that I did think of the renowmed 
Romans, or make these sanctifying reflections. 
True, I walked in the paths of pensive thought ; 
but it was only to think of Johma-Blount and of 
the emprise we had in hand. And when we 
reached the lonely mill on the Kennet, a few bow- 
shots below Sir Ingelric's castle at Speen, we hid 



156 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

ourselves behind the mill and blew three blasts 
upon a trumpet, for this was the only signal which 
John -a -Blount had asked for. " And now," said 
our lord abbat, telling his beads, " may the saints 
befriend the brave boy from Maple-Durham. The 
token of his success will be three corresponding 
blasts. Let us be motionless and silent until we 
hear them." For a space the sound of our own 
brazen instrument floated along the waters, and 
was given back in echoes by the sleeping hills ; 
and then for a longer space, during which an ex- 
peditious mass-priest might have said a camp-mass, 
nought was heard but the plash and ripple of the 
ever sweet and clear Kennet, and the faint moan- 
ing of some trees whose bare branches were shaken 
by the fresh gale which had blown away the clouds, 
and brought forth the lustrous and approving 
stars. But then, I wis, there came from the evil 
den the sounds of a mighty crash and clangour of 
arms that made us all start, and then sounds of 
woe and lamentation, shrieks and yells like those 
of the damned, which made us all shudder and 
cross ourselves. And, anon, upon these hellish 
sounds came three blasts from a trumpet, loud and 
shrill ; and at the hearing thereof our lord abbat 
clasped his hands and said joyously, " The bold 
youth is safe, the deed is done ; so now to the castle, 
which is ours !" 

And we all ran from behind the mill to the foul 
den, driving our captives with us at the spear point 
as before. Short was the distance, and great our 
speed ; yet before we reached the castle moat the 
drawbridge was down, the gate Mas open, and 
under the archway, in the midst of a company of 
men who had still chains and fetters on their legs^ 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 157 

but who held flaming torches in their hands, stood 
John -a- Blount with the gashful, blood -dripping 
head of the Wolf fixed on his lance. John had 
released the army of prisoners at the opportune 
moment, and being joined by some of Sir Ingelric's 
people, he had made himself master of the castle 
without need of any aid from us : but the Wolf 
and some of his evil band who could expect no 
quarter had made a desperate resistance, and had 
been slain to a man. The warder who had raised 
the portcullis and the few others who had aided in 
the emprise were now shouting for King Stephen, 
and Sir Alain de Bohun and the lord abbat of 
Reading, and the terrified captives we had with us, 
joined in these cries with such voice as their fears 
and astonishment allowed them to raise. As we 
all marched in at the gate the abbat said, " John, 
my son, I fear thou hast been somewhat too hasty 
and violent ! I would have put some questions to 
that wild beast before sending him hence ; yet is 
the Wolf better dead than alive ! But, my son, I 
trust thou hast not allowed harm to be done unto 
the dark ladie of this most dark and bloody lair ?" 

" The evil woman is safe in her bower ; I did 
lock her up before I unlocked the prisoners whose 
hearts were steeled against her/' said John. 

" And where," asked Sir Alain, " is the gentle 
flower that was not made to bloom in this horrent 
place ?" 

" There," quoth John, pointing to one of the 
female captives who came running across the qua- 
drangle of the castle with the little Alice in her 
arms. " She is there, the true and worthy child 
of her gentle and martyred mother, and may she 
long live to make compensation to the world for 

h3 



158 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

the many cruelties and crimes of her unnatural 
father ;" and as he spake John threw far from him 
into a dark corner the bleeding head of the Wolf ? 
lest Alice should be scared by the sight thereof. 

The clear child was presently in the arms of the 
good Lord of Caversham ; and though she had not 
seen his face for eighteen long months, and though 
she had not quite recovered from her great terror 
on being startled from her sleep by the clashing of 
arms and those shrieks and yells, she soon knew 
Sir Alain, and clung round his neck with many a 
fond kiss, and with many a fond inquiry after her 
own dear mother the Laclie Alfgiva and her com- 
panion and champion Arthur, whom she had left 
in sad case at Oxenford. 

The first thing we did within the castle was to 
secure our prisoners with the chains which Sir 
Ingelric's unhappy captives had been wearing, and 
to hurl them into that horrible and feculent prison 
where so many good and peaceful men had long 
been rotting. Next we gave food to some of the 
released captives who had been so tortured by fast 
that their bones were cutting through their skin. 
And then we did all assemble in the^ great hall 
with a great glare of torches and tapers, and the 
lord abbat and Sir Alain being seated on the dais 
at the head of the hall in the massy chairs in 
which Sir Ingelric and his dame had been wont to 
sit in the days of their pride and evil power, that 
dark ladie was summoned from her uneasy bower 
to that august presence. A dark dame was she, 
and fierce as an untamed she- wolf as she came into 
the hall, screaming that the empress-queen and 
her husband Sir Ingelric would know how to 
avenge the traitorous deeds of this night, and the 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 159 

foul surprisal of a loyal castle. These her -words, 
and others that were more vituperative, chafed our 
good lord abbat, and with a solemn and severe 
countenance he said unto her, " Peace, woman ! 
peace ! these be not words to be heard by the com- 
pany here assembled, who be all true men and 
faithful lieges to King Stephen. Most fit mate for 
a bloodthirsty and ungodly lord who hath changed 
his party as men change their coats, who hath 
never had in view ought else than his own interest, 
and who for these eighteen months last past hath 
stopped at no crime whereby he might enrich 
himself; dost call it loyalty to the queen or coun- 
tess to turn thy castle into a den of robbers and 
torturers, to waste the country round about it un- 
til it looks like unto a Golgotha, — to seize, rob, 
imprison, and torment all manner of men, as well 
the secret partisans of Matilda as the open parti- 
sans of King Stephen, as well the poor and lowly 
as the rich and great, and as well the quiet frank- 
lins and toiling serfs, who be of no party and who 
only seek to live in peace, as the knights and 
trained men of war that go forth to battle ? Call 
ye this loyalty and faithfulness to a party ? Ho- 
nourable men, alas ! may have honestly differed in 
these unhappy disputes, but thy husband hath been 
but a robber, and it is for that there be so many 
like him in the land that these wars have lasted 
so long. Dost call the seizing of priests and 
monks upon the highway loyalty? Dost call it 
Christian duty and reverence to mother church to 
kidnap the servants of the altar and put them to 
the rack as thy people have done ? Oh, woman, 
the holy water that baptised thee was thrown away ! 
Bat thou shalt away hence to some sure keeping 



160 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

in a lonely cell, where thou mayest have time for 
repentance and prayer. We did only send for 
thee that we might remind thee of thy many sins,, 
and get from thee the keys of thy ill-acquired trea- 
sures, and some list or knowledge of those who 
have been robbed by thee, to the end that we may 
make restitution." 

No ways humbled or abashed, the dark ladie of 
the castle called my lord abbat robber and house- 
breaker, and said that she had only levied tolls 
and baronial droits; that Sir Ingelric had taken 
away most of the money to give it to the misused 
and distressed queen ; and that it was but a small 
matter that which remained in the house. And 
then, with great pride and insolency, she threw down 
upon the table one heavy key, saying that that was 
the key to the only treasure. 

" The foul dame lies in her throat," cried one of 
her own people, " she hath treasure in other places ; 
she hath gold, and silver, and jewels, aye, and 
church-plate stolen from the very altar, hid in 
most secret hiding-places ; and, my lords, ye will 
not get to the full knowledge thereof unless ye do 
put her in her own crucet- house ! r ' 

Albeit, they were fully resolved to come at this 
great wealth, Sir Alain de Bohun shuddered at 
the mention of that terrible engine of torture, and 
the lord abbat said that such things were accursed 
by the church, and that verily he would never crucet 
a woman. 

" Then will ye never get at the silver and gold V 9 
said the man who had before spoken. 

But at this juncture the repentant old warder of 
the castle stood up, and said that his daughter, who 
had been handmaiden to Sir Ingelric's wife, knew 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 161 

the whole secret, having watched her mistress with 
feminine curiosity, and could so point out every 
recess and hiding-place; and at the hearing of 
these words the dark woman uttered a shriek, and 
fell to the ground as if her heart had been cleft in 
twain ; so fearfully had she and her lord sold them- 
selves to Lucifer, and made a god of money. The 
sight of blood and of the foe standing triumphant 
on her own hearth had not made her quail, nor had 
the mention of the crucet- house caused her to 
tremble ; but the thought of losing all her accursed 
spoil had gone through her like a knife. We could 
not leave her where she was, lest some of her lately 
released captives should lay violent hands upon 
her ; so we carried her to a turret- chamber, and 
having bound her so that she should not lay violent 
hands upon herself in a maniacal mood, and having 
placed one of her women to watch by her, we made 
fast that door and went in search of the treasure, 
being guided by the warden and his daughter. It 
was, in truth, but a small matter that which we 
found under the lock to which the dark ladie had 
given us the key ; but, in the hiding-places, within 
the thick walls, and under the stone floors of the 
dark ladie's bower (places so invisible and recon- 
dite that of ourselves we never could have found 
them), were piled silver and gold, and wrought- 
plate and jewels, that seemed to me enough to pay 
a king's ransom, and that made mine eyes twinkle 
as I looked upon them by that light from many 
torches. When he had gathered it all together in 
a mighty great heap, in the middle of the room, 
our abbat made fast that door also, and hung a 
crucifix to the door-post, and threatened with ex- 
communication all such as should approach the door 



162 A LEGEND OF HEADING ABBEY. 

until ordered by him so to do. " Souls have been 
lost/' said he, " in the getting together of that 
heap, and his soul will assuredly perish that touches 
it for his own use. It is all the property of the 
church, or the property of the poor, or the heavy 
ransom of tortured victims. The malison of heaven 
will go along with every part of it that is not re- 
stored to its rightful owners. So now, my children 
all, follow me down these flinty stairs to refresh 
yourselves with meat and drink ; for the day is 
dawning in the east, and we shall have hard work 
at daylight. This infamous donjon must down : not 
a stone must be left upon another." 

"I did help to build it," said Sir Alain, "but 
will now be more happy in destroying it ! Not a 
nook must be left to be repaired of my false- 
heartedjravenous friend, or of any other wolf of his 
choosing." 

" Humanity will bless the destruction ! Tears 
of joy will be shed for leagues round about," said 
one of the released captives ; " and when all dens 
of the like sort be a-level with the earth, England 
will be England again." 

It was a marvellous and a provoking thing to see 
how well the foul robbers had been victualled and 
provided ; gaunt hunger ranged all round them, and 
filled the fertile but untilled valleys with its cries 
and screams ; but their buttery was crammed with 
the best of meat, their stalls were filled with beeves 
and sheep, their cellars were full of ale, mead, and 
wine, their granaries with corn, their stables with 
the best of horses. Barely have I seen so sump- 
tuous a feast as that to which we did sit down in 
the castle hall, with our sharp winter-morning ap- 
petites. 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 163 

By the time this goodly collation was finished it 
was broad daylight. " So now," said the lord 
abbat, "will we think of carrying out these goods 
and chattels, and then of destroying tougher crusts 
than those of venison-pasties. Bring me forth the 
rascaille- people from the prison-house, that they 
may lend us their shoulders and aid us in destroy- 
ing their own foul nest." 

Being boyishly and unwisely curious to see with 
mine own eyes the abominable pit of which I had 
heard so much, I went with those that repaired to 
the house of captivity and torture, and one who 
had been released overnight did follow me thither 
to explain its horrible mysteries, as one who had 
full experience of them all. Misericordia Dei, 
into what a bolge of hell did my staggering feet 
carry me ! And what an atmosphere was that 
which made my head turn giddy and my stomach 
sick ! Deep in the bowels of the earth, within the 
foundations of the keep of the castellum, was a 
great chamber paved with the sharpest flints, and, 
dimly lighted from above by a few chinks, so nar- 
row that the bats could scarce have crept through 
them. The noisome air, never fanned by the sweet 
breath of heaven, was made more foul and poi- 
sonous by accumulated filth and stagnant pools of 
blood, paid a fetid smell of smoke. The torches 
we brought in to give us light to discover all the 
mysteries of the place burned with a sickly and 
uncertain flame. 

" Can man live here ?" said I. 

M I lay dying here the full length of nine moons," 
said my guide. 

" And what is this ?" said I, looking into a short 
narrow chest not much unlike the coffin of a child, 



164 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

but half- filled within with sharp stones and spikes 
of iron. 

" Curses on it, that is the crucet-house," replied 
£he man, " and therein they did thrust the body of 
a full-grown man, breaking his limbs and causing 
him exquisite torture. That was one of their pro- 
cesses for gratifying their cruelty or for extorting 
money. And this," continued the man, kicking a 
monstrous* great beam which seemed loaded with 
iron, and to be heavy enough to bear down and 
crush two or three of the strongest men, " this is 
one of their sachenteges, which they would lay upon 
one poor man, and these iron collars with the sharp 
steel spikes are what they put round men's throats 
.and necks, so that they could in no direction sit, or 
die down, or sleep, for these collars be fastened by 
these strong iron chains to the stone walls. In my 
time I have seen two men and a woman perish 
with these hell-collars about their necks." 

"And what be these sharp knotted strings ?" 
said I, growing more and more faint and sick. 

" These strings," replied the man, " they twisted 
round the head until the pain went to the brain. 
And see ! these be the thumb-screws. And see 
above-head that pulley and foul rope ! At times 
they pulled us up by the thumbs, and hung heavy 
coats of mail to our feet ; at other times they 
Ranged us up by the feet and smoked us with foul 
«moke until our blood and brain *' 

" By our Ladie of Mercy, say no more — show 
me no more ;" and so saying, I rushed out of the 
infernal place with a cold sweat upon my brow and 
my limbs all quivering. 

"I am told," said the old captive, who followed 
me, " that there be still worse prison-houses than 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 165 

this, and that there be many scores of them in the 
land." 

" May they all down !" said I ; " and may men 
in after days not believe that they ever stood 1 
But, franklin, I do pray thee say no more, for I 
feel those collars on mine own neck, and the anguish 
at the brain !" And, in truth, I was in so bad 
case that I could do nothing* until Philip the lay- 
brother did bathe my brow with some cold Kennet- 
water, and make me drink a cup of wine. 

The evil castle was soon cleared of whatsoever 
it contained (not even excepting a poor maimed Jew 
that had been so misused in the crucet-house that 
he could neither walk nor crawl), and so soon as 
everything was taken up we began to demolish the 
abominable walls. Many poor men who lived in 
that neighbourhood came to our assistance, and 
being first refreshed by meat and drink, they la- 
boured with astonishing vigour, giving joyous 
shouts whenever a great piece of the building was 
brought down. By commandment of our lord 
abbat the instruments of torture were all heaped 
together in that foul cell under the keep, and a 
great supply of wood, brush-wood, and straw being 
placed therein, fire was set to the whole, and so 
mighty a combustion was made that the stones 
cracked, and the flints seemed to melt, and every 
beam or other piece of timber taking fire, the 
greater part of the tower fell in with a terrific noise ? 
and a most hellish smoke. While the castle was 
burning it was terrible to see how r the impenitent 
dark ladie did gnash her teeth and stamp her feet ? 
as likewise to hear how she did curse Sir Alain de 
Bohun and our QT>od abbat, and all of us that were 
there present. Surely in that horrid frenzy she 



1G6 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

■would have died the death of Judas Iscariot if we 
had not bound her hands, and kept a strong guard 
over her. When the smoke cleared away, and we 
saw that the keep was nearly all down, our lord 
abbat distributed the victual and sheep and cattle 
among the famishing men who had come to help 
us, and who engaged not to leave the place until 
the moat should be filled up, and the walls all made 
level ; and then we departed with our prisoners and 
all the treasure to Pangbourne, rejoicing as we 
went. Only no joy could be gotten into the sad heart 
of John-a-lilonnt ; the commendations of that great 
man of war, the Lord of Caversham, did not cheer 
him, nor was lie made the happier by our good 
abbat's telling him that lie would provide well for 
him in some other manner of life than the monastic, 
for which he never could have had the due vocation. 
John thanked the lord abbat, but there was no joy 
in his gratitude. As I walked by his side I did 
try to comfort him by telling him that he had 
broken none of the greater vows of our order, as he 
was happily only in his noviciate ; but he only 
shook his head at this my remark, and said, " Felix, 
it is not so much a wounded conscience and remorse, 
as something else that is leading me to the grave !" 
And then I saw that he was thinking of that fo- 
reign damsel that had led him into sin, and had 
then spurned his love, and I did thrice cross myself 
and fall to telling my beads, for verily phantasms 
of that other black-eyed maiden in the green kirtle 
came flashing through mine own weak brain, aye, 
lively effigies of her, both as I saw her first in her 
pride and beauty in our abbey garden, and as I saw 
her last, famine-wasted and crushed with fear in 
the castle-yard at Oxenford. But the saints gave 



A LEGEND OF BEAD] 167 

to expel the visions, and I never saw 
those li\ ing perilous i in. 

To me the most tender and beautiful thing in all 
this our great adventure and emprise was the m 
ing- of little Arthur and Alice. Our good abbat 
was certainly of my mind, for he almost danced 
'with joy at the sight thereof, and kept long repeat- 
ing in his most joyous tones, s% These children w 
made the one for the other! It is not man that 

can separate them, or keep them long asunder! 

My predecessor abbat Edward said the words, and 

'ft of prophecy was in him before he died." 

The day being far advanced before we got back 

from the evil castle, we tarried that night at our 

poor-house at Pangbourne, keeping good watch ; 

for albeit we knew that our [Treat enemies "were 
afar off, yet were we and our poor serfs but as 
lambs among most ravenous wolves, bears, and 
lions — in medio htporum rapicu sifHO r u m, ur*Orum 9 

et leonum. A trusty messenger had been sent to 
Reading Abbey and the castle of Caversham the 
night before, and now we despatched another to 
bid the stay-at-home monks prepare a Te Deuni, 
and a feast for us on the morrow. 



( 168 ) 



IX. 



By times in the morning, the treasure, which filled 
six coffers of the largest, was put into boats to 
be floated clown Thamesis unto our abbey; and 
some of us going by water and some by land, we 
all proceeded thitherward, amidst the rejoicings and 
blessings of all the people. Eight glad were they 
all for the destruction of Sir Ingelric's stronghold I 
Had it been the fitting season they would have 
carried palm-branches before us, as was used at that 
blessed entrance into Jerusalem ; but it was dead 
winter, and the morning, though bright and clear,, 
was nipping cold. The first time it was I did see 
our hardy lord abbat muffle his chin, in a skin or 
fur brought from foreign parts. A glorious recep- 
tion, I ween, was that which awaited us ! Our 
brotherhood, to the number of one hundred and 
fifty, formed in goodly order of procession with the 
banners of our church displayed, and with the prior 
at their head bearing our richest rood, met us at 
the edge of the Falbury, all singing — " Beati qui 
veniant," — " Blessed are those that come in the 
name of the Lord ; blessed are those that come from 
the doing of good." And our good vassals of the 
township, and the franklins of Reading and the 
vicinage, were all there in their holiday clothes, 
and our near-dwelling serfs in their cleanest sheep- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 169 

skin jackets, shouting and throwing up their caps ; 
our abbey bells ringing out lustily and merrily the 
while. Needs not to say that we sang our best in 
the choir at that Te Deum, or that the feast which 
was ready by the hour of noon was sumptuous and 
mirthful. Nor was the joy less that evening in the 
castle at Caversham, whither I and some few others 
went with Sir Alain and the abbat ; for the lord of 
Caversham being ever of a pleasant humour and 
ofttimes jocose, did say that forasmuch as I, Felix 
the novice, and Philip the merry lay-brother, did 
first carry Alice by night in the little basket unto 
the castle, to the scandal of some and to the amaze- 
ment of all, so ought we now to carry back and 
present to the ladie Alfgiva the restored damsel ; 
and hereat the young Lord Arthur had clapped his 
hands, and said so it ought to be. 

And from this happy evening the bountiful ladie 
of Caversham grew well and strong, and the chil- 
dren grew up together in all love and loveliness. 
Somewhat squalid were they both when they were 
first brought home, but in a brief space of time they 
were plump and ruddy with health. The little 
maiden was then in her sixth year ; the little lord, 
as hath been said, only in his tenth. Truly it is 
wondrous to think how soon they grew up into 
womanhood and manhood ! And I the while was 
passing from blooming manhood to sober age ; yet 
did I not grieve with Horatius — Eheu I fugaces. 

When at our leisure we did examine the great 
treasure brought from the evil castellum at Speen, 
we found much money that bore the impress of the 
mint of our house, and divers pieces of plate which 
had been stolen by the countess's people out of our 
church. These things, as of right, we did keep ; 



170 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

but the rest of the plate we restored to the lawful 
owners thereof when we could discover them, which, 
sooth to say, did not happen on every occasion. 
Of the money which was not thought to be our own 
we did make two portions, and gave one to the 
poor and sent the other to King Stephen, who ever 
needed more money than he could get. But let men 
do ever so right and be ever so just and holy, they 
will still be exposed to evil constructions, and the 
sharp malice of evil tongues ; and therefore no mar- 
vel was it that many did say we made a great profit 
unto ourselves out of the sacking of Sir Ingelric's 
castle. 

And now, touching Sir Xngelric's dark wife ; she 
was shut up for a short season in Reading Castle, and 
was then carried away to the eastern parts, and was 
there confined in a solitary and very strong house 
of religion that stood on the sea-shore. Of the 
other prisoners, some, being foreigners, were 
shipped and sent beyond sea, and the rest of them, 
being native, were sent unto King Stephen's 
army. 

By the time we had returned unto our abbey, 
from Oxenford, it was hard upon the feast of the 
Epiphany, of the year of grace eleven hundred and 
forty-three. At the first coming of spring the king, 
who had been to London and the eastern parts to 
collect a great force, marched through Reading and 
tarried a few hours at our house, without doing- 
any notable damage thereunto, excepting always 
that he did borrow from us all the coined money in 
our mint, which he did intend to repay so soon as 
the country should be settled. But it grieved us 
much to learn that he, too, had hired and brought 
into England great tumultuary companies of Fie- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 17 1 

mings and Bourguignons and other half-baptized T 
unholy, ungodly men, who had no bowels of com- 
passion for the people of England, no respect for 
our holy places, but an insatiate appetite for plun- 
der. And these black bands, on marching away to 
the westward, brake open divers nunneries and 
burned sundry towns and churches, maugre all that 
the legate bishop of Winchester, who was with his 
brother the king, could say or do to prevent them. 
This sacrilege brought down vengeance and dis- 
comfiture upon the king's cause, and did drive 
away from his banner for that time our good Lord 
of Caversham. Matilda and her princely boy 
Henry remained in Bristowe Castle, or about that 
fair western country by the shores of the broad 
Severn, or on the banks of the Avon ; but some of 
her partisans had made themselves formidable at 
Sarum ; and to check the incursions of these the 
king turned the nunnery at Wilton into a castle, 
driving cut the chaste sisterhood and girding their 
once quiet abode with bulwarks and battlements. 
But while he was upon this ill-judged work the 
great Robert, Earl of Gloucester, on the first of the 
kalends of July, fell suddenly upon his encamped 
army, and by surprise and superiority of force did 
gain a great victory over King Stephen. The king* 
with his brother the bishop fled with shame, and 
the earl's men took the king's people and his plate 
and money -chest, and other things. Among the 
men of name that were taken at Wilton was Wil- 
liam Martell, the great favourite and sewer to the 
king, who was sent to Wallingford Castle, that 
terrible stronghold of Brian Fitzcount, which few 
men could mention without turning pale. Thus 
sundry more years passed with variable successes > 



172 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and every year heaped on each side fresh calamities, 
to the great ruin of the whole land. And still 
both parties brought over their hungry bands of 
adventurers, and still many of our great men, caring 
neither for one party nor for the other, continued 
their castle-building and their plundering for their 
own account, and still the poor and despairing 
people of England said that Christ and his saints 
were asleep. Villages and hamlets were fast dis- 
appearing, and that our towns were not all sacked 
and burned in these nineteen years of war, and that 
the substance of every man was not taken from him, 
was owing to the prayers of the church, and to the 
leagues and confederations which the franklins and 
free burghers did make among themselves, binding 
themselves by a solemn covenant each to assist the 
others. At first those who were men of war did 
laugh at these leagues, but after they had sustained 
many a check and defeat they were taught to respect 
the valour of our free men. I have known the 
weaver quit his shuttle and go forth to battle with 
sword and spear, and bring back captive from the 
field a knight and great lord ; and when numerous 
deeds of the like sort had been done by the honest 
folk who took up arms only for the defence of their 
own houses and properties and lives, the great lords 
and powerful men did either avoid these townships, 
or treat them with more gentleness and justice. 

It was in this year, at the fall of the leaf, that 
John-a-Blount died at Maple-Durham, and was 
buried there. After that our indulgent abbat had 
confessed him and shrieved him (upon penances 
duly performed by the said John), and had quitted 
and fully released him from the cucullus, the poor 
youth again put on the steel cap, and went to 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 173 

Caversham to serve as one of the garnison of that 
good house. Good were the lord and the happy 
little lordling unto John, and I ween the Laclie 
Alfgiva had a great care taken of him when she 
saw how sad he was, and how fast wasting. But 
neither cook nor leach, neither generous wine nor 
comfortable words, could restore strength, or infuse 
hope, or induce a composure and tranquillity of 
mind, or keep poor John any long season among 
us. His heart seemed broken within him ; and 
there was a flush on his wasted cheek, and then a 
terrible coughing. So at last my whilome compa- 
nion being able to do nothing, quitted Caversham 
and went to Maple-Durham, that he might die there 
among some of his kindred, and be buried under the 
sward by the wattled hillock which marked the 
grave of his father. That young Angevin Herodias 
was as much John's murtheress as she could have 
been if she had put poison in his meat, or a dagger 
into his heart. May his soul find peace, and her 
great sin forgiveness ! TTe did most of us weep as 
well as pray for poor John-a-Blount. 

In the year next after the battle at Wilton, 
King Stephen gained a great victory in the 
meadows which lie near to the abbey of Saint 
Albans, and our Lord Abbat Reginald did plant a 
goodly vineyard on the slopes by the side of our 
house at Reading, and did make an orchard a 
little beyond Kennet. Many other battles were 
there in this same year of woe ; and that great par- 
tisan of the countess, Robert Marmion, was slain 
in a fierce fight at Coventry ; and Geoffrey Mande- 
ville, Earl of Essex, was slain at Burwell ; and 
Ernulphus, Earl Mandeville's son, was taken after 
his father's death and banished the land. There 



174 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

seemed no end to these slayings and banishings 
and imprisonings in foul prisons. Verily those 
who made the mischief did not escape from its 
effects ! The cup of woe they mixed for the 
nation was put to their own lips ; turn and turn 
about they nearly all perished or suffered the ex- 
tremities of evil fortune ! None gained, all lost in 
the end, by this intestine and unnatural war. 

In the year of grace eleven hundred and forty- 
five King Stephen again passed by Reading, and 
went and laid close siege to Wallingford Castle ; 
but he could not prevail against that mighty robber 
and spoiler Brian Fitzcount : and on the feast of 
St. Benedict, at the close of this same year, I, with 
the saints' aid, having completed my noviciate, 
took the great vows and became a cloister-monk, 
with much credit and applause from the whole com- 
munity, the sweetmeats and all delicate cates being 
furnished for that feast by the bountiful Ladie 
Alfgiva, and both Sir Alain de Bohun and his 
son Arthur being present at the feast. That night 
there came from the plashy margent of Thamesis 
a meteor of rare size and brightness, and it stopped 
for the space of an Ave Maria over our house, and 
shined in all its brightness upon the tower ; as was 
noted by all the brotherhood, who did please to 
say that it was a good omen, portending that I 
should rise high in office, and be an ornament and 
shining light to the house : and truly since then 
I have passed through offices of trust and honour, 
and my name hath been made known unto some ofl 
our order in foreign parts, and I am now by the 
grace of our ladie sub-prior of this royal abbey of 
Reading. Also is it to be noted that in this im-f 
portant year we, the monks of Reading, were 



A LEGEND OF HEADING ABBEY. 175 

enabled to keep our great fair in the Falbury, on 
the day of St. Lawrence and the three days next 
following, according to the particular charter of 
privilege granted by our founder Henricus Primus, 
who commanded in the aforesaid charter that no 
people should be hindered or troubled either in 
their coming to the fair or in their going from it, 
under heavy penalties to be paid in fine silver. 
And the wise Beauclerc had thus ordered, for that 
the men of Newbury having a fair of their own 
about the same season, for the sale of cattle and 
much cheese, were likely to waylay and stop such 
as were coming to our fair, as in verity they after- 
wards did, despite of our charter and to the peril 
of their own souls. But the castle-builders and 
the robbers that were liege-men unto them, had 
done the Fair- wending franklins much more harm 
than had been done them by the wicked men of 
Newbury ; and in this sort our fair of St. Lawrence 
had been thinly attended for some years, and had 
not brought to our house in tolls, fees, and droits, 
one-half so mucli as the value of the alms we dis- 
tributed upon that saint's day. 

In the year which followed upon my vows, the 
husband of Matilda, the Count of Anjou, much 
grieving for the long absence of his son Henry, 
and seeing that the presence of one so young did 
no good to his mother's cause in England, en- 
treated that he might be sent back into Anjou, 
and young Henry was sent thither accordingly. 
It had been well for England if the count had 
gotten back his wife also, but he was too glad to 
leave Matilda where she was, for there had not 
been for many a year any love between them, and 
from the day of his marriage with her until Ma- 

i2 



176 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

tilcla's return to her own country to wage war in 
it, the count was said never to have known a day's 
peace. During his long abode in Bristowe Castle 
the boy Henry had been carefully nurtured and 
instructed by his uncle the Earl of Gloucester, 
and by some teachers gathered in England and in 
foreign parts ; and, to speak the truth of all men, 
the said earl was well nigh as learned as his father 
the Beauclerc, and a great encourager of human- 
izing letters. That great earl was also much com- 
mended by his friends for his constancy to the 
cause of his half-sister Matilda, and for his per- 
severance in all manner of fortunes, and for the 
equanimity with which he bore defeat and cala- 
mity ; but, certes, it had been better for us if his 
perseverance had been less, and if his equanimity 
had been disturbed by the woes and unutterable 
anguishes the people of England did suffer from 
his so long perseverance. But the hand of death 
was now upon him, and the great earl died soon 
after the departure of Henry Fitz-empress, and was 
buried at Bristowe in the choir of the church of 
St. James, which he had founded. And no long 
while after the departure of her son and the death 
of her valorous half-brother, the countess, to the 
great trouble of her husband, quitted England and 
went into Anjou ; and King Stephen, surprising 
and vanquishing his enemy the Earl of Chester, 
who had gotten possession of Lincoln town, did tri- 
umphantly enter into that town and abide there, 
which no king durst do before him, for that 
certain wizards had prophesied evil luck to any 
king that went into Lincoln town. Being thus 
within Lincoln, and somewhat elated with the 
smiles of capricious fortune, King Stephen sum- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 177 

moned the great barons and magnates of the land 
unto him, and at the solemnization of the Nativity 
of our Lord, he wore the regal crown upon his 
head, or, as others have it, he was re-crowned 
and consecrated anew in the mother church at 
Lincoln ; and having the crown of England, to 
all seeming, firmly fixed on his brow, he caused 
the magnates all to swear allegiance to his son 
Prince Eustace as his lawful successor in the 
realm. No great man gainsayed the king, but all 
present made a great show of loyalty and affection 
as well to the son as to the father. Many there 
were of them who had no truth or steadiness in 
their hearts; but Sir Alain, our good Lord of Ca- 
versham, was there, and likewise the young Lord 
Arthur, and it was with a faith as pure and entire 
as that of a primitive Christian that the nobles 
twain placed their hands within the hands of Prince 
Eustace and vowed to be his true men for aye. 
And as it was now time that Arthur should enter 
upon a more active life, and put himself in training- 
for the honours of knighthood, and as Prince 
Eustace conceived much affection for him, as did 
all who ever knew the hopeful youth, Arthur was 
left in the family of the prince to serve him as page 
and esquire. Yet was the young lord's absence 
from among us very short, for Prince Eustace 
came nigh unto Heading to prepare for the laying 
of another siege to TVallingford Castle, which still 
lay upon the fair bosom of the country like a 
hugeous and hideous nightmare, and whensoever it 
was not beleaguered the wicked garnison went 
forth to do that which for so many years they had 
been doing. Brian Fitzcount, the lord of Walling- 
ford, Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, and others not 



178 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEF. 

a few, had gone beyond sea with the countess ; but 
they meditated a speedy return with more bands of 
foreign marauders, and many of their similars and 
fautors shut themselves up in their home-castles, 
which were spread all over the country. These 
things prevented the entire blessing of peace ; yet 
was England more tranquil than she had been 
since the Beauclerc's death, and by a succession 
of sieges Stephen would have gotten the men 
of anarchy within his power if other accidents had 
not happened. 

As the king (who had long and grievously 
mourned for the license and castle-building he had 
permitted at the beginning of his reign, in the hopes 
of attaching the great lords to his interest) openly 
showed his resolution to curb the excessive power 
and fierce lawlessness of the feudal lords, a great 
outcry was raised against him, and divers of the 
lords of his own party began to plot and make 
league with the barons of Matilda's faction. Others 
fell from his side because he could give them no 
money or fiefs, unless he robbed other men or 
laid heavy tallages upon the poor people. As these 
selfish men deserted him, Stephen exclaimed, as he 
had done before, " False lords, why did ye make 
me king to betray me thus ! But, by the glory of 
God, I will not live a discrowned king !" And so 
much was granted to him in the end, that Stephen 
did die with the crown upon his head. Perad ven- 
ture might the king have had the better of his 
secular foes if in the midst of these troubles he had 
not quarrelled with the clergy and braved the 
wrath of the holy see. By the death of one pope 
and the election of another, the king's brother, the 
Bishop of Winchester, had ceased to be legatus a 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 179 

latere, and the legatine office had passed into the 
hands of Theobald, archbishop of Canterbury, who 
had ever leaned to the Angevin party. The said 
lord archbishop was no friend to our Lord Abbat 
Reginald, or to any of our community, but it becomes 
not me to rake up the ashes of the dead, or to disturb 
with a reproachful voice the grave of the primate of 
England ; and it needs must be said that the king 
was over violent in his regard, and undutiful to our 
father the pope. For it must ever be acknow- 
ledged that the triple crown of Rome is more than 
the crown of England, and that the head of the 
holy Roman Apostolic and Catholic church hath a 
power supreme in spiritualities over all the kings 
of Christendom. Nevertheless did King Stephen 
in an ill hour give a doom of exile against the Lord 
Archbishop of Canterbury, for that he had attended 
at the bidding of the pope, but without consent of 
the king, a great council of the church in the city 
of Rheims, in France. Instead of submitting to 
this sentence, the archbishop went and put himself 
under the protection of Hugh Bigod, the powerful 
Earl of Norfolk, who was of the Angevin faction, 
and then put forth a sentence of interdict against 
King Stephen, and all that part of the kingdom 
which obeyed the usurper. In the west country, 
and in some parts of the east and north, the priests 
shut up their churches and refused to perform any 
of the offices of religion. Good men went between 
the king anjcl the primate, and after two years a 
reconciliation was brought about, Stephen agreeing 
to be the most bountiful king and the best friend 
of the church that the church had ever yet known 
in this land. Yet when Archbishop Theobald was 
called upon to recognise and anoint Prince Eustace 



180 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

as heir to the throne, he refused to do it, saying 
that he was forbidden by our lord the pope, and 
that Stephen, being a usurper, could not, like a 
legitimate sovereign, transmit his crown to his 
posterity. The king, unto whom the archbishop 
had taken the" oath of allegiance, waxed wroth, and 
threatened the archbishop with a punishment sharper 
than banishment ; but, when the first passion of 
anger was over, he did nothing. Men censured the 
archbishop at the time, but they afterwards thought 
he had taken the wisest course for putting an end 
to this long war. In the interim Henry Fitz- 
empress had been again in our island. In the year 
eleven hundred and forty-nine, having attained the 
military age of sixteen, Henry Plantagenet came 
over to Scotland with a splendid retinue, to be 
made a knight by his mother's uncle, King David* 
The ceremony was performed with much mag- 
nificence in the city of Carlisle, where the old 
Scottish king did then keep his court ; and most of 
the nobles of Scotland and many of our great 
English barons were present at the celebration, and 
did then and there make note of the many high 
qualities of the truly great and ever to be remem- 
bered son of the Countess Matilda. All manner of 
honours and power alighted on the head of Henry 
Plantagenet soon after his being knighted at Car- 
lisle. The death of his father Geoffrey left him 
in full possession of the dukedom of Normandie, 
which he had governed for him, and of the earldom 
of Anjou, which was his own birthright ; and in 
that lucky year for the house of Plantagenet, the 
year of our redemption eleven hundred and fifty- 
two, by espousing Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry ac- 
quired that great dame's rights to the earldom of 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 181 

Poictou and the great duchy of Aquitaine. Henry 
was thus the greatest and richest prince in all the 
main land of Europe, and albeit he was only in his 
twentieth year, he already knew the arts of govern- 
ment and of war better than any of his neighbours. 
A great prince was he from his cradle : he was born 
to command. 

Et interim, Eustace, the son of Stephen, being 
nearly of the same age as the son of Matilda, had 
become a very worthy soldier, and our young Lord 
of Caversham had grown up with him, and im- 
proved under him. They had miscarried in the 
siege of AYallingford Castle, because that house of 
the devil was so exceeding strong, and because they 
were called off to another more urgent enterprise ; 
but in other quarters they had been more success- 
ful, beating divers of the castle-builders in the 
field, or taking them in their dens. Every castle 
that they took was burned and destroyed, like Sir 
Ingelric's castellum at Speen. They brought many 
offerings to our shrines, for they were much in our 
part of the country, to keep in check the Angevin 
party to the westward ; and whenever he was not 
engaged in these duties of war, the young Lord 
Arthur came to his home. The winter season al- 
lowed him the longest repose, and thus it befel that 
the Ladie Alfgiva and that little maiden which I 
and Philip, the lay -brother, did first convey to 
Caversham, became sad instead of gay at the ad- 
vance of spring. But Alice was no longer the little 
maiden that could lie perdue in a basket, and there 
had . already been many discourses and conjectures 
as to the day when she and the young Lord Arthur 
would be made one by holy church ; for the 
great love that had been between them from the 

i 3 



182 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

days of their childhood was known to all the 
country side. Strange it was, but still most true, 
that Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe never had made 
any attempt to recover his fair and good daughter. 
Great endeavours he made to get back that dark 
ladie of the castle, his wicked and impenitent second 
wife, and he had at last, by means, it was said, of 
the Archbishop of Canterbury, obtained her release 
from the nunnery on the eastern coast ; but he had 
never set on foot any treaty, nor, as far as could be 
learned, had ever made any inquiry touching the 
gentle Alice, who in her heart could not think 
without trembling and turning pale of her dark, 
stern step-mother, and the days she had passed with 
her in that foul donjon at Speen. 

Though his hair had grown grey and scant under 
the cap of steel, and his soul panted for peace as 
the hunted hart doth for running waters, Sir Alain 
de Bohun kept the field almost as constantly as his 
son ; and his constancy to King Stephen knew no 
abatement. So much virtue and steadiness could 
not be understood in those changeable and trea- 
cherous times ; and as it was thought that he put a 
monstrously high price upon his services, and was 
true to one side because he had not been sufficiently 
tempted by the other, in the course of the year 
eleven hundred and fifty-two there came a secret 
emissary to offer him one of the greatest earldoms 
in England, and one of the richest and noblest 
damsels in Anjou as a bride for his son. Sir Alain 
bound the emissary with cords, like a felon spy, 
and sent him and his papers and credential signets 
unto King Stephen. No mind was ruffled in 
Caversham Castle upon this occurrence except the 
tender mind of Alice, who bethought her that she 






A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 183 

was but a poor portionless maiden, the daughter of 
a proscribed man whose estates had long been con- 
fiscated and held by the king ; but Arthur saw 
and soon chased away these vain grievings. His 
father had manors and lands enow, and he wished 
never to be greater or richer than his father, and 
Alice was rich in herself, and she was his own 
Alice, and a greater treasure than any that dukes 
or kings or emperors could bestow. Let there be 
peace ; let there only be peace in the land for the 
herdsman and the tiller of the soil, and the in- 
dustrious vassals, and what earthly luxury or com- 
fort would be wanting in the house at Caversham ? 
Fools might contend for more, and barter their 
souls away to get it, but his father's son w r ould 
never be this fool. 

I was myself at Caversham at the time of these 
occurrences, and it was not long after that I be- 
came sub -sacrist in our abbey, and did build at 
mine own cost a new rood-loft in the church. 

Also in this year deceased, to King Stephen's 
great grief, the good Queen Maud, and she was 
buried at Feversham in Kent. 



( 184 ) 



X. 



Before the swallows made their next return to our 
meads and river sides, the flames of war were again 
kindled in our near neighbourhood. When that I 
heard Sir Ingelric had stolen back into the island 
with an Angevin band, and that Brian Fitzcount, 
through the treachery of some of King Stephen's 
people, had been allowed to win his way into his 
inexpugnable castle at Wallingford with great 
supply of munitions of war, I did foresee that the 
year eleven hundred and fifty-three would be a year 
of storm and trouble to Reading Abbey, and to all 
the country besides. Sir Ingelric's return was soon 
notified to us by the burning of divers villages be- 
tween Reading and Speen, and by the sudden plun- 
der and devastation of some of our own outlying 
manors ; and while we were grieving at these things, 
news was brought to us that Brian Fitzcount had 
called upon all the castle holders in the west to take 
up arms, not for the Countess Matilda, but for her 
son Henry ; and that the said Sir Brian had ravaged 
well nigh all the country from Wallingford to 
Oxenford, making a great prey of men and cattle. 

Sir Alain de Bohun and our stout-hearted Abbat 
Reginald collected such force as they could, and 
marched in quest of Sir Ingelric ; but that cruel 
knight fled at their approach, and then retreated 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 185 

into the far west. King Stephen made an appeal 
to the wealthy and warlike citizens of London, who 
were ever truer to him than were his great barons, 
and being well furnished with arms and men, and 
the great machines proper for the sieges of strong 
places, the king went straight to Wallingford with 
a determination not to remove thence until he 
had reduced that terrible castle. This time he 
came not unto our abbey, but the lord abbat sent 
some of our retainers to assist in the great siege ; 
and as all the lords that w r ere true to the king 
marched with the best of their vassals to Walling- 
ford, a great army was collected there. Of the 
people of that vicinage, every free man that was 
at all able to work repaired to the king's camp, and 
offered his labour for the capture and destruction 
of Brian Fitzcount's den. A deep trench was 
speedily cut all round the castle, and such bul- 
warks and palisadoes were made that none could 
come out of the place or enter therein ; and cata- 
pults were in readiness to batter the walls, and 
mines were digging that would have caused the 
keep to totter and fall. Certes, the emprise was 
close to a successful issue, when tidings were 
brought that Henry Plantagenet had landed in the 
south- w r est with one hundred and forty knights, and 
three thousand foreign foot soldiers, that all the 
great barons of the west were proclaiming him to 
be the iaw T ful king of England, and were joining 
his standard, and that he was moving with a mighty 
force to lay siege to Malmesbury. King Stephen 
had found no more faith abroad than he had found 
at home. Ludovicus, the French king, having 
many weighty reasons to mislike and fear Henry 
Plantagenet, had made a treaty of alliance with 



186 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Stephen, had affianced his daughter Constance to 
Prince Eustace the son of Stephen, and had en- 
gaged to keep the powerful Angevin at home by- 
threatening Anjou and Normandie with the inva- 
sion of a great French army ; but, instead of a 
great army, the French king sent but a few ill- 
governed bands ; and when these had been dis- 
comfited in a few encounters, Ludovicus listened to 
proposals of peace, and abandoned the interests of 
Stephen. And that great English earl, Ranulph, 
earl of Chester, whom King Stephen had driven 
out of Lincoln, went over to Anjou to invite Henry 
into England, and to engage soul and body in his 
service ; first taking care to obtain from that young 
prince a deed of charter conveying to him, the said 
Earl Ranulph, in foede et heriditate, the lands of 
William de Feveril, and many fiefs and broad ma- 
nors in Cheshire, Staffordshire, Nottinghamshire, and 
elsewhere, together with sundry strong castles which 
the said earl hoped to keep — but did not. Forced 
was King Stephen to raise his siege of Wallingford 
Castle, and to evacuate and destroy the wooden 
castle of Cranmerse which he had raised close to 
Brian Fitzcount's gates. He had scarcely drawn off 
his people, and begun a march along the left bank 
of Thamesis above Wallingford, ere Henry Planta- 
genet, having gotten possession of Malmesbury and 
of many strong castles, which the castle-builders, 
not foreseeing that which was to happen, had given 
up to him, appeared on the right bank of the river 
with his great army of horse and foot. The Plan- 
tagenet was of an heroical temper ; and Stephen, who 
had fought in so many battles, was yet as brave as 
his young rival, and was transported with wrath at 
seeing how many barons who had repeatedly sworn 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 187 

allegiance to him were in array against liirn ; more- 
over, Prince Eustace was with his father, and, like 
a valorous and passionate youth, was eager for the 
fight ; and of a certainty there would have been a 
terrible and bloody battle, if battle could have been 
joined at the first confronting of these two forces ; 
out a heavy and long-continuing rain had swollen 
all the rivers and brooks, and had poured such a 
volume of water into Thamesis that there was no 
crossing it. Therefore lay the two mighty armies 
opposite to each other for the space of several days ; 
and during that interval certain of our prelates be- 
stirred themselves as peace-makers, and sundry great 
lords on either side said that verily it was time this 
unnatural war should have an end. But Henry Plan- 
tagenet did want for his immediate wearing the 
kingly crown of England, and Stephen had vowed 
by the glory of God to keep that crown on his head 
until his death, and none durst speak to him of a 
present surrender of it. When the waters some- 
what abated the king marshalled his host, as if de- 
termined to come at his foe by crossing the river 
at a ford not far off; but upon mounting his war- 
horse, which had carried him in many battles, the 
steed stumbled and fell, not without peril to his 
rider. The king mounted again, laughing as at a 
trifling accident ; but when the horse fell a second 
time under him, his countenance became troubled. 
Nevertheless he essayed a third time, and for a 
third time the steed fell flat to the earth as though 
he had been pierced through poitrail and heart by 
an arrow. Then did the king turn pale, and his 
nobles 'gan whisper that this was a fearful omen. 

ci By our Ladie St. Mary," quoth Prince Eustace, 
" the steed hath grown old, and distemper hatli 



188 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

seized him during his days of inactivity in this 
swampy and overflooded country ! This is all the 
omen, and the death of the poor horse will be all 
our loss." 

And the resolute young prince would have 
mounted his father on another steed, and have 
marched on to the ford, and then straight to battle. 
But the Earl of Arundel, being much inclined to 
peace, and a bold and eloquent man, took advantage 
of the consternation which the omen or horse-sick- 
ness had created in the king's army, and going up 
to Stephen, he did advise him to make a present 
convention and truce with Henry Plantagenet, 
affirming that the title of Duke Henry to the 
crown of England was held to be just by a large 
part of the nation, and by some who had never 
been willing to admit his mother to the throne ; 
that the country was all too weary of these wars, 
and that the king ought by experience to know the 
little trust that was to be put in many of his pre- 
sent followers. (t But I will not die a discrowned 
king," said Stephen. " Nor shalt thou," replied 
the great Earl of Arundel. 

After many entreaties and prayers, the kingly 
mind of Stephen yielded so far as to allow a parley 
for a truce ; and Henry Plantagenet, not being less 
politic than warlike, entered upon a convention, 
and then agreed to confer with Stephen. 

The place for conference was so appointed that 
the river Thamesis, where it narrows a little above 
Wallingford, parted the two princes and the great 
lords that were with them ; so that from either 
bank King Stephen and Duke Henry saluted each 
other, and afterwards conversed together. The con- 
ference ended in a truce, during which neither party 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 189 

was to attempt any enterprise of war, but both were 
to discuss and amicably settle the question of Duke 
Henry's right to the crown upon the demise of 
Stephen. 

Prince Eustace had not been a prince if he had 
quietly submitted to an arrangement which went to 
deprive him of the succession to a great kingdom : 
he burst suddenly away from the king's camp r 
calling upon those who had taken the oaths to him 
to follow him to the east. Not many rode ofF with 
him ; but our young Lord Arthur, feeling the obli- 
gations of his replicated vows and the ties of duty 
and friendship, would not quit his master ; nor did 
his father Sir Alain, who had placed him in the 
prince's service, make any effort to restrain him. 
As for the good lord of Caversham himself, he re- 
turned to his home with the double determination 
of observing the truce, and of not giving up his 
allegiance to King Stephen, unless the king should 
voluntarily release him therefrom ; for, much as 
he sighed for the return of peace, Sir Alain prized 
his honour, and did never think that a good settle- 
ment of the kingdom could be obtained through 
falsehood and perjury. But woful apprehensions 
and sadness did again fall upon the house at Caver- 
sham, for the course taken by Prince Eustace was 
full of danger to him and his few adherents, and 
it was reported that his great anger and desperation 
had driven him mad. But short w r as the career of 
that hapless young prince, who, though born to a 
kingdom, lived not to see anything but the ca- 
lamities thereof. I wis those men who had most 
flattered him, and had taken oaths to him as to the 
lawful heir to this glorious crown of England, did 
speak most evil of him in the days of his adversity y 



1*90 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and after his death. I, who knew him and con- 
versed with him oft times, did ever find him a 
youth of a right noble nature, valorous and merci- 
ful like his father, and as devout and friendly unto 
the church as his mother Queen Maud. Yet may 
I not deny that in his last despair he did some 
wicked deeds which sorely grieved our young Lord 
Arthur, who could not prevent them, and who yet 
would not abandon him in this extremity of his 
fortune. Coming into the countries of the east, and 
finding few to join him, he burst into the liberties 
of St. Edmund, and into the very abbey of St. 
Edmund, king and martyr, and demanded from the 
Lord Abbat Ording, and the monks of that holy 
house, money and other means for the carrying on of 
his heady designs ; and when that brotherhood, as in 
duty bound, and like men that were unwilling to 
be wagers of new wars, did refuse his request and 
point out the unreasonableness and ungodliness of 
them, he ordered his hungry and desperate soldiers 
to seize all the corn that was in the abbey, and 
carry it into a castle which he held hard by, and 
then to go forth and plunder and waste the lord 
abbat's manors. The corn was carried to the 
castle, but before further mischief could be done 
the soul of Prince Eustace was required of him ; 
for that very day, as he sat at dinner in his castle, 
he dropped down in a deadly fit, and was dead 
before the kind Arthur could get a monk to shrive 
him. The Countess Matilda, I ween, had done 
worse deeds at Reading than Eustace did at St. 
Edmund's Bury, and, certes, the patrons and pro- 
tectors of our house, our Ladie the Virgin, and St. 
James, and St. John the evangelist, were not less 
powerful to punish than St. Edmund the king and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 191 

martyr ; nevertheless Matilda was let live, and the 
young Eustace perished in his prime. But these 
things are not to be scanned by mortal eye, and 
the judgments of heaven are not always immediate, 
and it might not have been so much in vengeance 
for Eustace's great sin in robbing the monks of 
St. Edmund's Bury of their corn, as in mercy to 
the suffering people of England, that the son of 
King Stephen was so suddenly smitten and re- 
moved. The monks of St. Edmund did, however, 
give out that it was their saint who slew him for 
his sin, causing the first morsel of the stolen victual 
he put into his mouth to drive him into a frenzy, 
whereof he died. Others there were who ac- 
counted for his opportune death by alleging that 
some subtile poison had been administered to him ; 
but of this was there never any proof. Our young 
Lord Arthur, without denying the great provoca- 
tion he had given unto St. Edmund, did always 
think that his brain had been touched ever since 
his father held the conference above Wallingford 
with Duke Henry, and that a great gust of passion 
killed him. But whatever was the cause of his 
death, and however sad was that event in itself, he 
was surely dead, and it was just as sure that the 
kingdom would be the better for it. If few had 
followed him while he was alive, still fewer stayed 
to do honour to his remains ; but Arthur, with a 
very sincere grief, and with all respect and piety, 
carried the body of his master to the sea-side, and 
thence by water into Kent, and saw it interred at 
Feversham by the side of Queen Maud, with all 
the rites and obsequies of holy church. Fidelity 
could not go beyond this ; the great arbiter, Death, 
had freed him from his allegiance and vows to the 



192 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

prince, and so from the honoured grave in Fever- 
sham Abbey, Arthur de Bohun rode with all pos- 
sible speed unto Caversham, So true was it, that 
nothing that man could do could keep Alice and 
him long asunder. 

Many of our wicked castle builders, who had 
not always respected the truce of God, would not 
now be bound by the truce concluded between two 
mortal princes ; and when the term of that suspen- 
sion had expired, some of the barons on either side 
would have renewed the war on a grand scale, and 
have carried it into all parts of the kingdom. Some 
few sieges were commenced, and some hostile move- 
ments made in the field, by King Stephen and Duke 
Henry ; but since the unhappy death of Prince 
Eustace, the king cared not much about keeping 
the crown in his family, for he had but one other 
lawful son, and this son, the gentle-tempered Wil- 
liam, was only a boy, and was without ambition ; 
for his eyes had not been dazzled by any near pros- 
pect of the crown, and none of the baronage had 
ever sworn fealty to him. And thus, when the 
peace-makers renewed their blessed endeavours, 
King Stephen was easily induced to agree that 
Duke Henry should be his successor in this king- 
dom, provided that he left him a peaceable posses- 
sion of the disputed throne for the term of his 
natural life, and bound himself to fulfil a few other 
engagements. The king's brother, the Bishop of 
Winchester, did now join with his old enemy, 
Theobald, archbishop of Canterbury, in urging 
this accord, and on either side the great barons 
recommended the adjustment ; for all were weary 
of the war except a few desperate robbers, whose 
crimes had been so numerous that they could not 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 193 

hope to escape punishment at the return of peace. 
Another great council of barons and prelates was, 
therefore, called together at Winchester ; and in 
that royal and episcopal city, on the seventh of the 
Kalends of November, in this the last year of our 
woe, eleven hundred and fifty-three, the agreement 
was finished, and a charter naming Henry heir to 
the throne was granted by Stephen, and witnessed 
by Theobald the archbishop, the Bishop of Win- 
chester, eleven other bishops, the prior of Ber- 
mondsey, the head of the knights Templars, and 
eighteen great lay lords. And a short season after 
this, the king and the duke travelled lovingly toge- 
ther to Oxenford, where the earls and barons, by 
the king's commandment, did swear fealty to the 
duke, saving the king's honour, so long as he lived; 
and the Plantagenet did pledge himself to behave 
to Stephen of Blois as a duteous and affectionate 
son, and to grant to him, all the days of his life, 
the name and seat of the kingly pre-eminence. In 
the presence of the best of our baronage, the king 
and duke did then confer about other state matters, 
and did fully agree and concur in this — that there 
must be an end of castle-building and castle- 
builders, that the donjons which remained must all 
down, and that the vengeance of the law must fall 
upon the robbers, whether they had been, or had 
pretended to be, followers of Matilda, or Stephen, 
or Duke Henry himself; for, being now acknow- 
ledged heir to the crown, Henry wished not to come 
into a wasted and impoverished land, and well he 
knew, at all times, that the prosperity of the people 
maketh the wealth, and power, and glory of the 
ruler. Those castles in the west, which had been 
given up to him by their builders, were presently 



194 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

levelled with the earth ; and even Brian Fitzcount 
was warned that he must quit his strong house at 
Wallingford, or abide the most fearful conse- 
quences. Some of the cruel oppressors of their 
country came in of their own will, and submitted 
to King Stephen and the law ; but others held out 
stiffly, denying all allegiance whether to the king 
regnant or to Duke Henry as his successor ; and in 
this sort the poor people in divers parts continued 
to be harrowed, and plundered, and captured, and 
tortured, as in the foregone time. Nay, some of 
our wicked barons, making league with therapinous 
princes and wild chiefs of the Welsh mountains, did 
continue to keep the open fields in the western parts, 
and to desolate the land from the river Severn even 
unto the river Mersey. 

Many were the private discourses which King 
Stephen held with the hopeful Plantagenet, for 
Stephen's heart was all for the commonalty of 
England, and he trusted that he could give such 
instruction and advice to Henry as would aid that 
prince in making his future government firm, and, 
at home, pacific, and in that sort a blessing to the 
people. But the Plantagenet had solemnly pledged 
his faith by treaty and by oath to leave unto 
Stephen, so long as he should live, the full exercise 
of the authority royal, and this could hardly have 
been if Henry had tarried in England ; and, more- 
over, matters of high concernment called for the re- 
turn of the duke to Anjou and Normandie. So, in the 
spring season of the year of grace eleven hundred and 
fifty-four, after some long consultations held at Dun- 
stable to treat of the future state and peace of the 
kingdom, the king accompanied the duke to the sea- 
coast, and, with a loving leave-taking of Stephen, 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 195 

Henry embarked and sailed over to Normandie. 
Foul rumours there were, as that Stephen's young 
son with a party of Flemings would have waylaid 
the duke on Barham downs, and have there slaugh- 
tered him ; but I wis all this was but a fable, for 
the boy William was too young for such matters, 
and being of a gentle and unambitious nature, and 
too well knowing that the crown of England had 
been a crown of thorns to his father, he was more 
than content with the glands and honours secured 
unto him by the Charta Conventionum. 

Also was it nigh upon the time that William, 
archbishop of York, a kinsman of King Stephen, 
who had been deprived by the pope in the year 
eleven hundred and forty-seven, and who had been 
reinstated after the truce concluded at Wallingford, 
suddenly departed this life at York, and was buried 
with great haste and little ceremony in that minster. 
And here too there were evil reports spread through 
the land as that Archbishop William had been 
poisoned. Having no light wherewith to penetrate 
the darkness of this mystery, I will not affirm that 
King Stephen's kinsman was so disposed of; but 
verily the malice of men's hearts was great, and 
there was much secret poisoning in these times ! 

Stephen being thus left to govern by himself, 
sundry of our great men, having from that which 
they had seen and heard of Prince Henry come to 
the conclusion that if he should be king he would 
keep a bit in their mouths and keep a strong rein 
in his own hands, did repair to the king who had 
so often been betrayed by them, and did strongly 
urge him to break the treaty and trust to war and 
the valour and faith of his vassals for the continu- 
ance of his family on the throne. But Stephen 



196 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

having a respect for his oaths (which mayhap was 
the greater by reason of a sickness that was upon 
him), and knowing the trust that was to be put in 
the faith and steadiness of these men, said, " There 
hath been war enough, and too much woe!" and 
he would not give his ear unto them, but did com- 
mand forces to be gathered for putting down the 
castle-builders and the robbers that had allied 
themselves with the Welsh. 

And of a surety in these his last days King 
Stephen betook himself wholly to repair the ruins 
of the state, and heal the great afflictions of the 
church. He made a progress into most parts of 
the kingdom to reform the monstrous irregularities 
which had arisen by long war, to curb the too great 
baronial power, to get back to our abbeys and 
churches the things whereof they had been de- 
spoiled, and to speak and deal comfortably with all 
manner of peace-loving men. Some castles he re- 
duced by force, others he terrified into submission, 
£nd others were taken by a few good lords like Sir 
Alain de Bohun. In all these occurrents nothing 
was heard of our impenitent neighbour Sir Ingelric, 
save that his wife the dark ladie of the castle had 
died, and that he himself was thought to have gone 
into the west. Of that greater and far more ter- 
rible chief, Brian Fitzcount, we did hear enough 
and more than enough, for in despite of the joint 
commandment of King Stephen and Duke Henry, 
he kept possession of his castle at Wallingford and 
continued his evil courses in all things. Yea, at a 
season when we did apprehend no such doing, one 
of his excommunicated, companies, stealing by 
night down the vale of Thamesis, did set fire to our 
granaries at Pangbourne, and maim our cattle, and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 197 

so sweep our basse-court that we had not left so 
much as one goose wherewith to celebrate the feast 
of St. Michael. The better to put down these 
atrocious doings, King Stephen called together 
within the city of London a great and godly meet- 
ing of barons and prelates and head men of towns ; 
and sooth to say the spirit of peace and love presided 
over that great council, and many proper methods 
were taken by it and good laws passed. I, who 
went unto London city with our lord abbat, did see 
with mine own eyes the respect which was now paid 
unto the eldermen of great towns and boroughs, 
and likewise to the franklins, whether mixed by 
the marriages of their fathers or grandfathers with 
Norman women, or whether of the old and unmixed 
Saxon stock, the number of these last being as a score 
to one ; and then did I say to myself that if these 
things continued, the day might arrive when the 
burghers and free plebeians of England might be 
something in the state. Nay, I did even dream 
that in process of time the collar might be taken 
from the neck of our serf, and the cultivator of the 
soil be no longer a villein, but a free man. But I 
concealed this my bright vision, lest it should ex- 
pose me to censure and mockery. 

When this great council at London was broken up 
King Stephen made repair unto Dover to meet and 
confer with his ancient ally and friend the Earl of 
Flanders. The king was well attended, and among 
the best lords of England that went with him was 
our neighbour Sir Alain de Bohun. We, the monks 
of Reading, or such of us as had gone to the great 
city, journeyed back to our abbey, in a great fall of 
autumnal rain ; and when, at the end of three days, 

K 



198 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

we in uncomfortable case did reach the abbey, we 
found that the swollen river had swept away good 
part of the mill which we had built on the Kennet, 
at a short space from our house, and had otherwise 
done us much mischief. Also was there seen a 
great falling star, and there were heard in the hea- 
vens, on one very dark and gusty night, some dolor- 
ous sounds, as of men wailing and lamenting. In 
a few days more some sad but uncertain rumours 
did begin to reach our house ; but it was not until 
one stormy night in the early part of November, 
when Sir Alain de Bohun on his way homeward 
stopped at our gates, that we knew of a certainty 
that which had befallen. Ah, well-a-day, King 
Stephen was dead ! He who for well nigh nine- 
teen years had not known one day's perfect peace 
was now, inasmuch as the world and mortal man 
could affect him, at peace for ever ! And may 
God have mercy on his soul in the world to come ! 
After the politic conferences with the Earl of 
Flanders, and the departure of the said earl for his 
own domimions, the king was all of a sudden seized 
with the great pain of the Iliac passion, and with 
an old disease which had more than once brought 
him to the brink of the grave ; and so, after short 
but acute suffering, he laid him down to die, and 
did die in the house of the monks of Canterbury, 
on the five and twentieth day of the kalends of 
October. Sic mors rapit omne genus. And our 
true-hearted lord of Caversham, who was true unto 
death, and who had tenderly nursed the dying king, 
conveyed the body to Feversham, and placed it in 
the same grave with his beloved wife Maud, and 
his son Stephen, in the goodly abbey which he and 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 199 

his queen had built and endowed in that Kentish 
township ; and having in this guise done the last 
duty to his liege lord and king, and being by death 
liberated from the oaths of fealty and allegiance, 
which he had never broken by word or deed, Sir 
Alain, caring for none of the honours and advance- 
ments which other lords were ready to struggle for 
at the coming in of a new king, came quietly home, 
only hoping and praying that his country would be 
happy under Henry Plantagenet. 

King Stephen being gone, much evil was said of 
him on all sides and by all parties : yea, his own 
partisans, in the expectation that such words would 
be grateful to the ear of the new king, did affect to 
murmur and lament that he should so long have 
kept the great Henricus from the throne ; and, 
generaliter, the great men did burthen the memory 
of Stephen with the past miseries of the people of 
England, of which they themselves had been the 
promoters. I have said it : the defunct king, in 
the straits and troubles into which he had been 
driven by the greed, ambition, and faithlessness of 
the baronage, had ofttimes done amiss, and, spe- 
cialiter, had much travailed churchmen : yet be it 
remembered that he built more royal abbeys than 
any king that went before him ; that he founded 
hospitals for the poor sick ; and that during the 
whole of his troublous reign he laid no new tax or 
tallage upon the people ; and that he w T as of a na- 
ture so mild and merciful that notwithstanding- the 
many revolts and rebellions and treasons practised 
against him, he did never put any great man to 
death. I, Felix, who had seen how large he w r as of 
heart and how open of hand, and who had tasted of 

k2 



200 A LEGEND OF BEADING ABBEY. 

his bounty and condescension, could not forget 
these things when, in a few days, after saying a mass 
of Requiem for his soul, we chanted in our church a 
Te Deum laudamus for his successor. 



( 201 ) 



XL 



I have said that we heard all too much of our 
powerful and wicked neighbour Brian Fitzcount. 
But now that he knew Henry Plantagenet was 
coming, and was one that would have power to 
destroy him and to put an end to all plundering 
and castle-building, a sudden repentance seized his 
time-hardened conscience. Some did much praise 
him for this, and greatly admired the seeming se- 
verity of his penance ; but it is to be feared that 
he, like many others among our castle-builders and 
depredators, did only repent when he found that 
he could sin no more. So great had been his 
crimes, and so noted was Duke Henry for his strict 
execution of justice, that, notwithstanding his long 
adherence to Henry's mother, Sir Brian could not 
hope to escape a severe punishment, with forfeiture 
of the broad lands which had become his by mar- 
riage, and with deprivation of the great riches he 
had accumulated by plundering the country. In 
this wise no secure asylum was open to him except 
in the cloisters or in taking the cross. And before 
the Plantagenet returned into England Sir Brian 
Fitzcount did take upon him the cross, and giving 
up his terrible castle at Wallingford with all his 
fiefs, and abandoning all his riches — relictis for- 
tunis omnibus — he joined other crusaders and took 



202 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

his departure for Palestine. His wife Maud, the 
rich daughter of Sir Robert d'Oyley, had before 
this time retired into a convent in Normandie, and 
there, being awakened to a sense of the wickedness 
of her past life, she did soon take the veil. As 
they had no issue, and left no knight near of kin, 
King Henry, soon after his coronation, took pos- 
session of Wallingford Castle and of the honour of 
Wallingford ; and from that happy moment the 
troubles of the country and of our good house 
ceased. Such was the fate of our worst enemy ; 
but of the scarcely less wicked Sir Ingelric of 
Huntercombe we still could learn nothing of cer- 
tain, and the rumours which reached us were very 
contradictory, some saying that he had been slain 
by Welsh thieves, some that he had fled beyond 
sea, some that he had entered into religion under 
a feigned name, and was preparing to take the mo- 
nastic vows in the Welsh house at Bangor, and 
some asserting that he had gone with a desperate 
band into Scotland to take service with that king 
and aid him in subjugating the wild mountaineers 
of the north. Nay, there was still another report 
common among the poor country folk that dwelt 
upon Kennet near Speen, and it was to the effect 
that Satan had carried him away bodily. In short, 
none knew what had become of him, but all prayed 
that they might never see his face again. 

Henry Plantagenet was busied in reducing the 
castles of some of his turbulent barons in Nor- 
mandie when he received the news of King Ste- 
phen's demise. Being well assured that none in 
England would dare question his right to the va- 
cant throne, and being moreover a wise prince, 
who always finished that which he had in hand be- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 203 

fore beginning any new thing, he prosecuted his 
sieges, and ceased not until he had reduced all the 
castles. Thus it was good six weeks after the 
death of Stephen, and hard upon the most solemn 
festival of the Nativity, when Henry came into 
England with his wife Eleanor and a mighty com- 
pany of great men. He was received as a deli- 
verer, and there was joy and exultation in the 
heart of every true Englishman at his coming. 
A wondrously handsome and strong prince he was, 
albeit his hair inclined to that colour which got 
for his great -uncle the name of Rufus or Tied 
King. His forehead was broad and lofty, as if it 
were the seat of great wisdom, and a sanctuary of 
high schemes of government. His eyes were round 
and large, and while he was in a quiet mood, they 
were calm, and soft, and dovelike ; but when he was 
angered, those eyes flashed fire and were like unto 
lightning. His voice ! — it made the heart of the 
boldest quake when he raised it in wrath, or in 
peremptory command ; but it melted the soul like 
soft music when he was in the gentle mood that was 
more common to him, and it even won men's hearts 
through their ears : it was by turns a trumpet or a 
lute. Great, and for a prince miraculous, was his 
learning, his grandfather, the Beauclerc, not having 
been a finer scholar : wonderful was his eloquence, 
admirable his steadiness, straightforwardness and 
sagacity in the despatch of all business. He 
breathed a new life, and put a new soul into the 
much worn and distracted body of England. 
There shall be peace in this land, said he ; and 
peace sprang up as quick as the gourd of the pro- 
phet : there shall be justice among men of all de- 
grees; and there was justice. Having taken the oaths 



204 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

to be good king and lord — to respect mother church 
and the ancient liberties of the people, the great 
Plantagenet was solemnly crowned and anointed in 
the royal city of Winchester on the 19th of the 
kalends of December, by Theobald, archbishop of 
Canterbury ; and Eleanor, his wife, was crowned 
with him. In the speech which he did then de- 
liver, he boasted of the Saxon blood which he in- 
herited from his grandmother, Queen Maud, of 
happy memory, who descended in right line from Al- 
fred us Magnus : and these his royal words did much 
gratify the English people, without giving offence 
to the lords and knights of foreign origin, who, 
by frequent intermarriages, had themselves become 
more than half Saxons, and who had long since 
prided themselves in the name of Englishmen, and 
would, in truth, be called by none other name. 
And full soon did Henricus Seeundus make it a 
name of terror to Normandie, to the whole of 
France, and all circumjacent nations ; and now that 
I write, in his happy time, hath he not filled the 
highest offices in church and state with men of 
English birth, and with many of the unmixed Saxon 
race ? From his first entrance into the government 
of this realm, he was principally directed in matters 
of law and justice by our great lord archbishop, 
Thomas a Becket, then only archdeacon of Can- 
terbury, provost of Beverley, and prebendary of 
Lincoln, and St. Paul's, London ; and our Lord 
Thomas, as all men do know, is the son of Gilbert 
a Becket, merchant of the city of London. 

King Henry kept his Christmas at Bermondsey ; 
and it was from that place that he issued his royal 
mandate, that all the foreign mercenaries and com- 
panies of adventure that had done such terrible 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 205 

mischief in the wars between King Stephen and 
Matilda should depart the land within a given time, 
and without carrying with them the plunder they 
had made. Divers of these men had been created 
earls and barons, and still kept possession of fiefs 
and castles, but they nearly all yielded for the great 
dread they had of the new king, and so got them 
out of England by the appointed day, as naked and 
poor as they were when, for our sins, they first came 
among us ; and many a Fleming and Brabanter, 
Angevin and Breton, from being a baron and castle- 
builder, returned to the plough-tail in his own 
country. As the spring season approached, our 
great king repaired unto Wallingford Castle, and 
there convened a great council of earls, bishops, 
abbats, and some few citizens of note and wealthy 
franklins. It was a pleasant and right joyous 
journey that which I had with our Lord Abbat 
Reginald, and Sir Alain de Bohun, and my young 
Lord Arthur. Already the hamlets which had 
been burned began to rear again their yellow- 
thatched roofs in the bright sun ; the wasted and 
dispeopled towns were already under repair ; the 
shepherd, with his snowy flock and skipping lambs, 
was again whistling on the hill sides like one that 
had nought to fear ; the hind was singing at his 
labours in the fertile fields ; the farmer and the 
trader were travelling with their wains and pack- 
horses, from grange to market and from town to 
town, without dread of being robbed, and seized, 
and castle-bound ; skiffs and barks were ascending 
and descending the river with good cargaisons, and 
without having a single lance or sword among their 
crews ; the trenches cut in the churchyards were 
filled up, the unseemly engines of war were taken 

k3 



206 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY, 

down from the church towers, and the church bells, 
being replaced, again filled the air with their holy 
and sanctifying sounds. Even the wilderness and the 
solitary place partook of the spirit of this universal 
peace and gladness: there was sunshine in every 
man's face, whether bond or free. In summa, it 
seemed, in truth, a time when the wolf dwelt with 
the lamb, and the leopard lay down with the kid, 
and the lion with the fatted calf; when the iron of 
the great engines of war was turned into a plough- 
share, the sword into a pruning-hook, and the 
lance into a pastoral crook. I, who did well re- 
member the sad state of things only a few months 
agone, did much marvel that a country could so 
soon recover from the horrors of war, and the 
depth of a universal anarchy and havoc ; and did, 
with a melting heart and moistened eye, offer up 
my thanks to the Giver of all good things that it 
should be so. 

It was at Wallingford that I did see, for the first 
time, our far-renowned Thomas a Becket. There 
was no seeing him without discerning the great 
heights to which he was destined to rise, even more 
by his natural gifts than by the king's favour. At this 
time he numbered some thirty -six or thirty-seven 
years ; and from his childhood those years had been 
years of study or of active business, as well of a secu- * 
lar as of an ecclesiastical kind. A handsome man was 
he at that season, and blithe and debonnaire, and, 
mayhap, a trifle too much given to state affairs, and 
the pomps and vanities of this world, for a church- 
man : but, oh, John the Evangelist, what a mind 
was his ! what readiness of wit and reach of 
thought ! And what an eagerness was in him to 
raise his countrymen to honour, to make his country 



A LEGEND OF BEADING ABBEY. 207 

happy and full of glory, and to raise the church in 
power and dignity ! " Angli sumtis, we be Eng- 
lishmen, " said he to our lord abbat, " and we must 
see to raise the value of that name." Great and 
long experienced statesmen there were in this great 
council at Wallingford, men that had travailed in 
negotiation at home and abroad, and that had 
grown grey and bald in state offices ; but verily 
they all seemed children compared with the son of 
our London merchant, and they one and all sub- 
mitted their judgment to that of Thomas a Becket, 
who had barely passed the middle space of human 
life. Numerous were the wise and healing reso- 
lutions adopted in that great council, the most valu- 
able of all being, that the crown lands which King 
Stephen had alienated, in order to satisfy his rapa- 
cious barons, should be resumed and re-annexed to 
the crown ; and that not one of the eleven hundred 
and more castles, which the wicked castle-builders 
had made in Stephen's time, should be allowed to 
stand as a place of arms. Some few were to re- 
main to curb the Welsh and Scots, or to guard the 
coast ; but these were to be intrusted to the keeping 
of the king's own castellans ; of the rest, not a 
stone was to be left upon another. This had been 
decreed before, but time had not been allowed 
King Stephen to do the work ; and so easy and 
over indulgent was he, that it is possible the work 
would not have been done for many a year if he 
had continued to live and reign. 

Even in these sun- shining days there were some 
slight clouds raised by the jealousies and ambitions 
and craving appetites of certain of our great men, 
who sought to raise themselves at the cost of others. 



208 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

Certain magnates whose names shall not soil this 
pure parchment — certain self-seeking men who had 
been allied with Brian Fitzcount and Sir Ingelric 
of Huntercombe, and who, like Sir Ingelric, had 
shifted from side to side, tried hard to fill the ears 
of King Henry and his secretarius Thomas a Becket 
with tales unfavourable to Sir Alain de Bohun and 
his son Arthur ; as that they had made war against 
the king's mother, and had oppressed and plundered 
the lords that w«re favourable to her cause, and 
had ever been the steadiest and most devoted of all 
the partisans of the usurper Stephen. But neither 
the king nor a-Becket was to be moved by these evil 
reports. " I do see," said the sharp and short-deal- 
ing secretarius, " that all the good and quiet people 
of his country bear testimony in favour of the Lord 
of Caversham and his brave son : I do further see 
(and here a-Becket, with a light and quick thumb, 
turned over great scrolls of parchment which had 
affixed to them the name and seal of King Stephen) 
that in the nineteen years he so faithfully served 
the late king, the said Sir Alain de Bohun hath 
not added a single manor, nay, nor a single rood 
of land, to the estates bequeathed unto him by his 
father or inherited through his wife ; and also do 
I see that he hath aspired after no new rank, or 
title, or office, or honour whatsoever, but is now, 
save in the passage of time and the wear of nine- 
teen years' faithful and at times very hard service, 
that which he was at the demise of Henricus 
Primus ; and having all these things in considera- 
tion, I do opine that the Lord of Caversham hath 
ever followed the dictates of a pure conscience, 
and hath ever been and still is a man to be trusted 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 209 

and honoured by our Lord the King Henricus Se- 
cundus." 

. " And I," quoth the right royal Plantagenet, 
" I who am come hither to make up differences, to 
reconcile factions, to heal the wounds which are 
yet bleeding, and to give peace to this good and 
patient and generous English people, will give 
heed to no tales told about the bygone times. The 
faith and affection which Sir Alain de Bohun did 
bear unto my unhappy predecessor, in bad fortune 
as well as in good, are proofs of the fidelity he will 
bear unto me when I have once his oath. My 
lords, there be some among ye that cannot show 
so clean a scutcheon ! What with the turnings 
from this side to that and from that to this, and 
the castle-buildings and other doings of some of 
ye, I should have had a wilderness for a kingdom ! 
But these things will I bury in oblivion, and this 
present mention of them is only provoked by ill- 
advised discourses, and the whisperings and mur- 
murings of a few. But let that faction look to 
this — I am Henry Plantagenet, and not Stephen of 
Blois ! With the laws to my aid I will be sole 
king in this land, and be obeyed as such ! The 
reign of the eleven hundred kings is over ! Let 
me hear no more of this. By all the saints in 
heaven and all their shrines on earth ! I will hold 
that man mine enemy, and an enemy to the peace 
of this kingdom, that saith another word against 
Sir Alain de Bohun, or his son, or any lord or 
knight that hath done as they have clone in the 
times that be past/' 

And so it was that our good Lord of Caver sham 
was received by the king, not as an old enemy but 
as an old friend, and was admitted to sit with the 



210 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

greatest of the lords in consultation in Wallingford 
Castle, and there to give his advice as to the best 
means of improving the condition of his country. 
And a few days after this, when Sir Alain and his 
son Arthur had taken the oaths of allegiance and 
fidelity unto King Henry and his infant son, the 
king with his own hands made our young Lord 
Arthur knight, giving him on that great occasion 
the sword which he had worn at his own side, and 
a splendid horse which had been brought for his 
own use from Apulia in Italie, out of the stables 
of the great Count of Conversano, who hath long 
bred the best horses in all Christendom, to his no 
small profit and glory. 

Upon the breaking up of the council of Wal- 
lingford our great Plantagenet prepared to march 
into the west with a well furnished army, in order 
to reduce by siege the castles of Hugh Mortimer 
and a few other arrogant barons who had the mad- 
ness to defy him. Before quitting Brian Fitz- 
count's great house, the king said to Sir Alain de 
Bohun, " For forty days, and not longer, I may 
have my young knight Sir Arthur with me. Unto 
thee, in the meantime, I give commission to level 
every castle whatsoever that hath been left stand- 
ing in this fair country of Berkshire. 

Seeing our lord abbat start a little at these words, 
the king said, in his sweetest voice, " Aye, my 
lord abbat, even Reading Castle must down with 
the rest ; but ye will not feel the want of it, for 
with God's help none shall trouble thy house, or 
cause the least mischief to thy lands or vassals 
while I am king of England ; and as a slight token 
of my trust and esteem, thy good and near neigh- 
bour Sir Alain shall keep his battlements standing. 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY- 211 

It were a task worthy of thee, good my lord, that 
thou shouldest even go with Sir Alain on his pre- 
sent mission, and sprinkle some holy water on the 
ground where these accursed castles have stood, 
and build here and there a chapel upon the 
6pots." 

Our abbat, who ever much affected the society 
of Sir Alain, and who loved the good work in hand, 
said he would perform this task ; and for this the 
king gave him thanks. 

" Before I go hence," said the king to the Lord 
of Caversham, " is there no grace or guerdon that 
thou wouldest ask of me ?" 

Sir Alain responded that he and his son had had 
grace and guerdon enow. 

u By our Ladie of Fontevraud," quoth theking^ 
" I have given thee nothing, and have only given 
thy son a horse and a sword and his knighthood. 
Bethink thee, good Sir Alain, is there no thing that 
thou canst ask, and that I ought to give ? " 

Sir Alain smiled and shook his head, and said 
that there was nothing he could ask for. 

" By the bones of my grandfather/' quoth the 
king, " thou art the first man I ever found in 
Anjou, Normandie, or England, of this temper of 
mind ! But I have a wish to give if thou hast none 
to take ; I charge thee with a service that is im- 
portant to me and the people, and that must cost 
thee somewhat ere thou shalt have finished it ; and, 
therefore, would I give thee beforehand some suit- 
able reward What, .still dumb and want- 
less ? " 

Here our lord abbat, bethinking himself of sun- 
dry things, whispered to his neighbour, " Sir Alain, 
say a word for Sir Arthur's marriage with the 



212 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

gentle Alice, and ask the king's grace for a free 
gift of the forfeited lands which once appertained 
to Sir Ingelric. ,, 

u Beshrew me," quoth the Lord of Caversham, 
" I never thought of the king's consent being ne- 

o o o 

cessary to my son's marriage. I thank thee, lord 
abbat, and will speak to that point." Yet when he 
spake, all that he told was the simple story of the 
nurture which had been given in his own house by 
his sweet wife to the fair daughter of Sir Ingelric, 
and of the long and constant love which had been 
between that maiden and his only son, and all that 
he asked was that the king, as natural guardian of 
all noble orphans, would allow the marriage. 

The eyebrows of the Plantagenet kept arching 
and rising in amazement, until Abbat Reginald 
thought that they would get to the top of his fore- 
head, high as it was. When he spake again, which 
he did not do for a space, he said, " And is this 
formula, that costs me nothing, all that thou hast to 
ask from the King of England, Duke of Normandie, 
and Earl of Anjou, Poictou, and Aquitaine?" 

" Verily," replied Sir Alain, " 'tis all that I can 
think of, and for that one favour I will ever be 
your bedesman." 

" Sir Alain," said our abbat, tugging him by the 
skirt, ^ thou hast said no one word touching the 
lands of Sir Ingelric." 

" We need them not," said the high-minded 
old knight, "we be rich enow without. If Sir 
Ingelric were alive and penitent, I might, in this 
happy time of reconciliation and oblivion of past 
wrongs, ask the fiefs for him ; but as it is, let them 
go, or let the king keep them — he may need them 
more than I." 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 213 

" Well !" quoth the Plantagenet, " I see thou 
hast taken counsel. So now, my trusty Sir Alain, 
tell me what guerdon I shall give thee for the ser- 
vices with which thou art charged." 

" My liege lord," quoth the lord of Caversham, 
" I, who in the times that are past have so often 
done that which liked me not for no fee or reward, 
but only in discharge of the oaths I had sworn. 
would not now ask a guerdon for the performance 
of a task so grateful unto me. Let my son espouse 
the fair Alice, and I am more than content." 

But the king, who had been turning things over 
in his mind while our abbat had been counselling Sir 
Alain, now called in Sir Arthur de Eohun, and said 
to him thus : — " Sir Knight of mine own making, 
I, the king, do give unto thee the hand of that little 
ladie Alice thou wottest of; and 1 do confer as a 
dower upon the said ladie Alice all the manors, 
honours, and lands whatsoever that were by her 
mother conveyed to Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe. 
It were not well that so noble a damsel should go 
portionless to her husband. Ye may be people of 
that rare sort that would care not for the fiefs, but 
the noble maiden might feel it. The less we say 
of her unnatural sire Sir Ingelric the better for 
him and for us. Whether he be dead or alive, the 
lands which were his through his two marriages are 
confiscated. It were but a common act of justice 
to give back to the maiden that which was her 
mother's, and I would as my free gift add the lands 
of the second marriage. A-Becket shall see to it, 
and draw up the grant before we go hence. Sir 
Arthur, I hail thee lord of Speen, and wish thee 
joy with thy bride. These forty days of war will 
soon be over, and with thy ladie's prayers to help 



214 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

us, we may finish with this mad Hugh de Mortimer 
in much less time." 

Arthur knelt at the feet of the Plantagenet, and 
kissed his royal hand, and said it was too much 
grace and over much greatness ; and both father 
and son joined in telling the king that the lands of 
the mother of Alice would be more than enough 
without the inheritance of the dark ladie. 

" Of a truth,'' said Sir Alain, " I should fear 
that that evil heritage would come to us burthened 
with a curse ; for it was ill acquired by the father of 
the dark ladie, and was ever by her misused." 

" Well," quoth the king, " we will keep part of 
those lands in our own hands, and give a part to 
the abbat and monks of Reading, who will know 
how to remove the curse with masses and prayer, 
and almsgiving to the poor." 

It was now the turn of our lord abbat to give 
thanks, which he did like the noble and learned 
churchman that he was. And all these things 
being pre-arranged, Thomas-a-Becket penned the 
royal grant, for the fair Alice, and a new charter for 
our house ; and the king signed and sealed the 
twain. By the charter he confirmed all preceding 
charters and donations. And he gave to the abbey 
two good manors which had belonged to the dark 
ladie, together with permission to enclose a park, 
in the place called Cumba, for the use of the sick, 
whether monks or strangers. And very soon after, 
upon his returning out of the west country, the 
king, by a particular charter, gave the monks of 
Reading licence to hold a fair every year on the day 
of St. James and the three following days, and 
confirmed our old right to a Sunday market at 
Thatcham, commanding the inhabitants of the 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 215 

country to attend the said market, and the jealous 
men of Newbury not to hinder them or molest 
them. He also made us a grant of forty marks of 
silver, to be paid annually out of his exchequer 
until he should be enabled to secure unto us a re- 
venue of the same value in lands. Verily, we the 
monks of Reading did no more suffer for that which 
we had done in the past time than did our noble 
neighbours of Caversham. When that the great 
men saw in what high esteem Sir Alain and Sir 
Arthur were held by the king, they spake to them 
cap in hand, and vexed their wit to make them fine 
flattering speeches ; yea, the very lords who had 
essayed to work their ruin did now make them big 
professions of friendship. 

So the Plantagenet departed and went unto 
Gloucester and Bridgenorth with his great battalia 
and engines of war, and the lord abbat and I, 
Father Felix, went with Sir Alain de Bohun to 
perambulate and perlustrate the country of Bark- 
shire, bearing with us the royal mandate to all 
heads of boroughs and townships and all good men 
to assist in rooting out the foul donjons which dis- 
figured the fair country like blots of ink let fall 
upon a pure skin of parchment. Expeditive and 
very complete was the work we made ; for even as 
at Speen the country people of their own free will 
came flocking to us with their pickaxes and mat- 
tocks on their shoulders ;- and so soon as a castle 
was levelled, our lord abbat, in pontificalibus, did 
sprinkle holy water upon the spot to drive away the 
evil spirits that had so long reigned there ; and did, 
in the tongue of the people, as w r ell as in Latin, put 
up a prayer that such wickednesses might not be 
again known in the land. Divers strange things 



216 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

and many recondite holes and corners, and most 
secret and undiscoverable chambers, were brought 
to light in the course of these demolishings ; but it 
was not until we broke down and took to pieces a 
castle near Shrivenham, on the confines of Barks, 
an outlying and little known place, that we lain* 
open to the light of day a very tragic spectacle, 
which was in itself a conclusion to a part of this 
my narration. Upon our coming to it, this cas- 
tellum, like all the rest, was deserted, the draw- 
bridge being down, and the portcullis and all other 
gates removed by the serfs of the neighbouring 
manors, who had made themselves good winter fires 
of the wood thereof. Nay, some poor houseless 
men had for a season dwelt within the keep, and 
penned their swine in the courtyard ; but they had 
been terrified thence by unaccountable and hor- 
rible noises at midnight ; and these men and their 
neighbours declared that it was the most accursed 
place in all the country. It was a wonderful thing 
to see how fast those walls toppled down, and how 
soon the deep moat was filled up. When the thick 
southern wall of the square keep was all but levelled, 
Sir Alain de Bohun's people came suddenly upon 
a secret chamber which had been contrived with 
much art and cunning within the said wall. The 
men reached it by demolishing the masonry above, 
but the access to it had been through a crooked 
passage which mounted from a cell underground, 
and then through a low narrow doorway, the door 
of which contained more iron than oak, and closed 
inward with certain hidden springs, the secret 
whereof was not to be apprehended by any of us 
until the door was knocked down and taken to 
pieces. Within this dark and narrow chamber was 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 217 

revealed a great heap of gold and silver, being well 
nigh as much as we had found at Speen ; and, prone 
upon this heap, with the face buried among the gold 
and silver pieces, and with the arms stretched out 
as though he had died in the act of clutching the 
heap, was seen the body of a knight in black mail. 
At the first glance Sir Alain's people and the serfs 
that were helping them cried out joyously, " Gold ! 
gold !" but then they took the knight in his armour 
for some scaled dragon or demon that was guard- 
ing the treasure, and they ran away, crying " Dia- 
bolus ! It is the devil !" 

As it especially concerned monks to deal with the 
great dragon, and lay evil spirits, Abbat Reginald 
and I, Father Felix, with an acolyte, who was but 
of tender age, and truth to say, sorely afeared, 
hastened with Sir Alain to that pit within the 
wall. 

" By the blessed rood !" said the Lord of Caver- 
sham, as he looked down into the hollow space — 
c; That is no living devil, but the dead body of 
Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe ! I know him by 
that black mail of Milan, and by the rare hilt of 
that sword, which I did give him when we were 
sworn friends and brothers." 

" This is wonderful, and I see the finger of 
Heaven in it," said our abbat, crossing himself: 
and we all crossed ourselves for the amazement 
and horror that was upon us. The meaner sort, 
who had fled from the dead knight, now bethought 
themselves of the glittering gold, and came back to 
the edge of that narrow pit ; and when we, the 
monks, had thrown some holy water therein, and 
caused our acolyte to hold the cross over the gap, 
two of Sir Alain's men-at-arms descended, and re- 



218 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

ascending, brought forth the body and laid it at 
our feet upon its back, and with its face turned 
towards the heavens. Jesu Maria ! but it was a 
ghostly sight ! From the little air that had been 
in that narrow cell, and from the great siccity or 
dryness of the place, betwixt stones, flint, and 
mortar, the body had not wasted away, or under- 
gone the rapid corruption of the damp grave ; and 
albeit the face was all shrivelled and shrunk, it 
was not hard to trace some of the lineaments of the 
unhappy Sir Ingelric. Within the cavity of the 
mouth were pieces of coined gold, as tho' he had 
set his famishing teeth in them ; and within his 
clenched hands, clenched by the last agony and 
convulsion of death, were pieces of gold and silver. 
On the brow was the well-known mark of a wound 
which that unhappy knight had gotten in his early 
days in fighting for King Stephen ; the Agnus Dei, 
and the little cross at the breast, were those of Sir 
Ingelric, and were marked with his name ; and the 
blade of the sword bore the conjoined names of Sir 
Ingelric and Sir Alain. Having noted and pointed 
out all these things, Abbat Reginald, after another 
and more copious aspersion of the blessed water, 
which is holier than the stream which now floweth 
in Jordan, raised his right hand and said, " My 
children, there is a dread lesson and example in 
that which lieth before us ! Crooked courses ever 
lead to evil eDds, albeit not always in this nether 
world. But here is one that hath reaped upon 
earth the fruit of his crimes, and that hath perished 
by the demon that first led him astray — aye, 
perished upon a heap of gold and silver, and of 
famine, the cruellest of deaths, and in a miser's hole 
— a robber's hiding-place — unpitied, unheeded, un- 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 219 

confessed, with the fiend mocking him, and bidding 
him eat his gold, and with the interdict of holy 
mother church and the curses of ruined men press- 
ing upon his sinful soul. And was it for this, oh 
Sir Ingelric, that thou didst soil thy faith, and 
betray thy king and friends, and waste the fair 
land of thy birth, and rack and torture the poor ? 
Take hence the excommunicate body and bury it 
deep in unconsecrated earth ; but remember, oh my 
children, all that which ye have this day seen !" 

The gold and silver we removed and put into 
strong coffers, in order that we might use them 
with the same justice and regard to the poor that 
we had used with the treasure found in Sir Ingel- 
ric's own castle at Speen. 

When we came to make inquiries among the 
people of those parts, and to put their several re- 
ports together, we made a good key to the awful 
enigma and mystery of Sir Ingelric's death. That 
castle by Shrivenham had been made by one of 
the very Worst of the castle-building robbers, who 
had never raised any standard but his own over 
his donjon keep. In the autumnal season of the 
year preceding that in which we came to destroy 
the place, and at the time when the joint orders 
of King Stephen and Henry Plantagenet were sent 
forth against the castle-holders, there suddenly 
appeared at Shrivenham a band that came from 
the westward, and that were headed by a knight in 
black mail, and with a black plume to his casque ; 
and by some of those reaches of treachery which 
were common among these evil doers, the new- 
comers got possession of this castellum, and made 
a slaughter of the builder of it, and of the men 
that were true to him. But the new comers had 



220 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

not been a clay in possession of the castle when 
intelligence was brought them by a scout that a 
force of King Stephen, which had tracked them 
from the westward, was approaching Shrivenham ; 
and thereupon, and for that the castle was too un- 
furnished with victual to withstand any beleaguer, 
the strangers fled from it more suddenly than they 
had come to it. As the vicinage was almost de- 
serted, and as the few people fled and hid them- 
selves, the black band had no communications with 
them during their brief stay ; but two poor serfs 
who had watched their departure had described it 
as being full of panic, terror, and of a dread of 
other things besides that of the close approach of 
the king's force (which force never came at all) ; 
for they had heard the band bewailing that they 
had no longer a leader, that their chief had disap- 
peared in the castellum, and that the devil must 
have carried him off bodily : and the serfs did well 
mark that the knight in the black mail was not 
among them, nor at their head, as they had seen 
him at their first coming. And as Sir Alain's 
people, in finishing their good work at the castel- 
lum, threw open the subterrain winding passage, 
of which mention hath been made, they found the 
body of an old man with a bundle of great keys 
at his girdle, and a long dagger sticking in his left 
side ; and his head lay close to the strong door of 
the treasure chamber, and between the body and 
the door were picked up a strong bag and part of 
a long extinguished torch. 

" By Saint Lucia, who presideth over man's 
blessed organ of sight and the glorious light of day," 
quoth our abbat ; " by sweet Saint Lucia, I do see 
daylight through that dark passage. The bait of 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 221 

that gold drew Sir Ingelric hither, to be taken as 
in a trap. He was eager to have the first hansel- 
ling and most precious bits of the treasure, or may- 
hap to carry off the whole, or conceal it for his 
own use, counting upon more time than heaven 
allowed him. That old unshriven traitor was, 
doubtless, one of the men of the castle-builder, that 
betrayed their master, and him Sir Ingelric slew so 
soon as he had led him to the chamber and opened 
the door, with the intent that he should not divulge 
unto others the secret of the hiding place. Per- 
adventure, the old man in his death-struggles 
dashed out the light and pulled to the open door ; 
or Sir Ingelric, being left in darkness, and unin- 
formed of the fastenings, did in his great haste 
kick the door and so cause it to fly to, and shut for 
ever upon him." 

We did all think that the riddle was well read 
by Abbat Reginald, and that this was a natural 
conclusion to the other and better known inci- 
dents of Sir Ingelric's dark story. 

By the time we had finished with the wicked 
castles of Barkshire, our great and ever victorious 
King Henry had finished with that perverse man 
Hugh de Mortimer ; and as we came to our house 
at Pangbourne on our way back to Reading, we 
there met the young Lord of Caversham, Sir Ar- 
thur de Bohun, who had been dismissed to his home 
by the king, and not without some further proof of 
the royal friendship, for, as it was ever in his nature 
to do, Sir Arthur had done manfully in the king's 
sieges and other emprises. It was a happy meeting 
to all of us, and there was no longer any public 
calamity to cloud or reproach our private happi- 
ness. The donjons were all down, or in good keep- 



222 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

ing ; and, from end to end and in all its breadth 
England was at peace, and none of the baronage 
were so daring as to resist the king and the law. 
Dulce mihi nomen pads I — ever sweet unto me was 
the name of peace, and now we had both the name 
and the substance of it. It was therefore resolved 
at Pangbourne that the marriage of Sir Arthur and 
the Lady Alice should be celebrated on the feast of 
St. Michael the Archangel, which was now near at 
hand. 

Upon coming to Caversham Sir Alain de Bohun 
hung his shield upon the wall, intending to go forth 
to no more wars. Then he put into the hands of 
the gentle Alice the king's charter which conferred 
upon her the domains of her mother, telling her, in 
his jocose way, that as she had now so goodly an 
inheritance she might be minded to quit the hum- 
ble house and poor people at Caversham, and get 
her to court to match with some great earl. And 
at this that fairest of maidens placed the king's 
charter in the hands of Sir Arthur, and with a 
blushing cheek and without words spoken, went out 
of the hall. Sir Arthur did afterwards inform her, 
in the gentlest manner, of the sure death of Sir 
Ingelric many months agone ; and, albeit he had 
been so unnatural a father, Alice shed many tears, 
and made a vow to give money to the church and 
poor, that his sinful soul might be prayed for. The 
dreadful manner of Sir Ingelric's death was care- 
fully concealed from the young bride, and hath 
never been fully made known unto her. She was 
united to Sir Arthur in our abbey church, on the 
happiest festival of St. Michael that our house had 
ever known, for the season was mild and beautiful, 
the harvest had been abundant, we had gotten in 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 223 

all our crops without hindrance, our granaries were 
filled with corn and our hearts with joy ; and as all 
of us, from the lord abbat down to the obscurest 
lay brother, had a surpassing affection as well for 
the gentle bride as for her noble mate, who had in a 
manner been our son and pupil, and an old rever- 
ence and love for Sir Alain and his ladie, we could 
not but rejoice at the great joy we saw in them. 
But all good people, gentle or simple, bond or free, 
did jubilate on this happy day ; and when the bride 
and bridegroom returned homeward, the procession 
which followed them, shouting and singing, and call- 
ing down blessings upon their young heads, was so 
long as to run in an unbroken line from the midst 
of the King's mead to the end of Caversham-bridge ; 
for our good vassals of Reading town had all put 
on their holiday clothes and shut up their houses, 
and all the people of Caversham were afoot, and 
Tilehurst, and Sulham, and Charlton, and Purley, 
and Sunning, and Speen, and Pangbourne, and 
every other township and village for miles round- 
about had poured out their inhabitants ; and not a 
franklin or serf, not a man, woman, or child among 
them all, but was feasted either by Sir Alain or Sir 
Arthur, or by us the monks of Reading. Methinks 
the sun never rose and set upon so beautiful a day ! 
The air and the earth rejoiced, and the flowing 
waters ; the full Thamesis and our own quick and 
resonant Kennet made music and thanksgiving 
together ; and seemed it to me that I had never so 
loved the country of my birth, and the fair scenes 
in which my life had been past from infancy to ripe 
manhood ; and yet had I ever loved that fair 
country above all that mine eyes had seen in 
much travelling. Natale solum dulcedine cunctos 

l2 



224 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

mulcet. Oh native soil, thou softenest man's heart, 
and fillest it with love of thee ! 

Now did the Ladie Alice more than verify the 
happy prediction which our good Abbat Edward 
put forth in the stormy time, to wit, that the little 
maiden which came to our house in the basket, and 
which I, Felix the novice, and Philip the lay-bro- 
ther did convey by night unto Caversham, would 
make amends for the ingratitude and treasons and 
other wicked doings of her father. Betwixt that 
merry wedding-day and the day that now is, there 
have been nine long years, and they have all been 
years of peace and happiness to the good house at 
Caversham, with that increase and multiplication 
which God willed when the world was in its infancy 
and all unpeopled. 

Happy, too, hath been our house at Eeading, and 
great the increase of the abbey in beauty and splen- 
dour. Some few griefs and trials we have had ; 
for earth, at the happiest, was never meant to be 
heaven ; and we all live to die, and must die to 
live again. The good and bountiful Lord Abbat 
Reginald deceased on the fourth of the kalends 
of February, in the year of grace eleven hundred 
and fifty-eight ; but he died full of years and honour, 
and verily, the Lord Abbat Roger that now is, hath 
been approved his very worthy successor. As our 
wealth increased under the blessed peace, and the 
sage government of our great king, and the favour 
of our Lord Thomas a Becket, for some while 
chancellor of the kingdom, and now and for the two 
years last past, by the grace of God, Archbishop 
of Canterbury and Primate of England, we of the 
chapter did begin to think that our church was not 
sufficiently lofty and spacious, and that wondrous 



A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 225 

improvements might be made in it, if we devoted 
to the task some of our superfluous wealth. And 
six years agone, when our Lord Reginald was in the 
twelfth year of his government over us (may our 
Ladie the Virgin, and St. John and St. James ever 
have him in their holy keeping), we made a be- 
ginning ; and the year last past, being the year of 
our redemption eleven hundred and sixty-four, we 
finished our great church, which hath been so much 
enlarged and altered that it may be called a new 
church; and Rex Henricus Secund us being present 
with ten suffragan bishops, and great lay barons too 
many to count, our Lord Archbishop Thomas did 
consecrate it with that solemnity and magnificence 
which he puts into all his doings : and on the very 
day on which the archbishop consecrated our church, 
the king, keeping his royal promise, granted us a 
land revenue of forty marks of silver out of the 
manor of Hoo in Kent, by assignment of Sir Robert 
Bardolph, the lord of that manor. 

And our mighty and ever victorious king, who 
is no less a friend to learning and learned men, 
nor less a patron of the church than was his grand- 
father the Beauclerc, hath ordered books to be 
bought for the enriching of our library, and hath 
given us another charter confirming our liberties 
and immunities, and enjoining all the kings that 
may come after him to observe the same, and calling 
upon the Lord to snatch them out of the land of 
the living, together with their posterity, if they or 
any one of them should seek to infringe our charter, 
or lessen our rights and properties. " Quam qui 
inf ring ere vel minuere presumpserit, extrahat eum 
dominus et ever tat de terra viventium cum omni 



226 A LEGEND OF READING ABBEY. 

\ 

posteritate sua" These be the king's very words I 
in the second great charter he hath given us. 

Here I surcease from the pleasant labours which 1 
have amused the few lonely hours that my various 
duties left me. There cannot be a better time to E 
stop and say vale ! Henricus Secundus is king ; . 
Thomas a Becket is primate ; Roger is lord abbat j 
of Reading ; and I, Felix the Sunningite, and 
T> mM 'ce that was, am poor sub-prior ; and every 
mum \)f the house is a man of English birth. It 
hath been noted of late, that our prior declineth 
apace ; and there hath been a talk among the 
cloister monks that I best merit that succession, 
which would place me next in dignity and greatness 
to the mitred lord abbat of this royal abbey. But, 
alas ! what is increase of dignity but increase of 
care ! I do hope that our good prior may live all 
through this winter ; albeit, it is a very sharp one, 
and old men be falling fast around us. — Vale et 
semper Vale ! 



THE END. 



LONDON ! WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET. 



THE 



DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 



AUTHOR OF ' THE CAMP OF REFUGE.' 




XOR CAS 



LONDON: 
CHARLES KNIGHT & CO., LUDGATE STREET. 

1845. 



London; Printed by William Clowes and Sons, Stamford Street. 



THE 

DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 



CHAPTER I. 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. 



Expecting the reader to follow us, we take a walk 
through the city of London, and stop at a large 
ugly pile of building which stands not far from, 
Tower Hill and the water-side. This building is 
the old Navy-Office of the time of Charles II. It 
occupies the site of Lumley House, formerly a 
monastery belonging to the order of friars called 
the Brothers of the Holy Cross, whose Latin desig- 
nation — Fr atres Sanct^: Crucis — has been 
awkwardly Anglicised into Crutched Friars. It 
is a place which has witnessed many changes. At 
the Reformation Henry VIII. made a grant of the 
house to that delight of the muses and of mankind, 
Sir Thomas Wyatt, the friend of the accomplished 
Earl of Surrey, and here Wyatt once lived, and 
meditated, and wrote. At a later period the great 
hall of the friars had been converted into a glass- 
house for the blowing of drinking-glasses. The 
greater part of the buildings had been consumed 
by fire, through the carelessness of the glass-blow- 
ers, whose trade had so intimate a connection with 



6 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

drink : yet the present building — or the Navy- 
Office — does rather more than occupy the site of 
the monastic edifice, for it includes whole portions 
of the dwelling of the Friars, and notably parts of 
the cloisters, and the whole of the ancient gate of the 
monastery, which now, even as in the olden time, 
has a wicket in it, and a grated aperture with a 
sliding-board behind it. 

But in front of this gate we find not a group of 
monks of the order " Sane tee Crucis," but a crowd 
of rough English sailors with pieces of paper and 
tickets in their hands, and with an expression of 
great dissatisfaction and anger upon their counte- 
nances. One of these men advances right up to 
the gate, and, after ringing a great bell by the side 
of it, he beats impatiently with his horny fist upon 
the wicket. A porter, not in a cowl, but wearing 
a blue cap, moves the sliding-board, peeps through 
the small iron grating, and instead of opening the 
wicket, says, in no very gentle tone, " What ! here 
again ! back so soon ! What would ye now ?" 

" Master Strong," says the sailor, " we would 
change these tickets for money — we cannot get 
money, or the money's worth for them— we lack 
bread, and would have it, as we have earned it by 
hard service in the king's ships ; our men's wives 
and children be starving ! But, first of all, we 
would have speech with their honours." 

" Will Gaff," says the porter, " I may not open 
the door ; I cannot admit thee and thy noisy crew. 
Much trouble befel me the last time I did so. 
There is no Board sitting to-day : their Honours 
are all away to Whitehall to see the King's majesty 
and his highness the Duke play a match a bowls." 

" Nay," says Will Gaff, " their Honours told us 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. 7 

last week that there would be a Board to-day, and 
that measures would be taken to give us money in- 
stead of these tickets, which the very Jews will no 
longer take even at the rate of a crown for the 
pound." 

u True," says the janitor, " there was to have 
been a Board this afternoon ; but their honours 
heard of this great bowling-match, and could not 
but go to it." 

" Ay, ay ! sport before duty — pleasure before 
business ! that seemeth now the rule with all men in 
office ! and thus it befalleth, Master Strong, that the 
affairs of the country go amiss, and we poor mariners, 
who fight for the country, be left to starve." 

" Art turning fanatic and leveller ? Hast been 
bitten by some preaching Fifth Monarchy man ? 
Have a care, Will Gaff, or perchance thou mayest 
get an overhauling for high treason, and die the 
death of Yenner !" 

" Avast there, Master Strong, avast ! No fanatic 
am I, or leveller — though I am levelled enow my- 
self, by poverty and want — I never bear up for a 
conventicle. No preachings have I heard since I 
was afloat in the t Royal Charles/ where the chap- 
lain told us to fear God and honour the king. 
God bless his majesty, say I, and God bless the 
duke, with all my heart — 

" God bless King Charles, the Duke of York, 
The Koyal Family." 
And I do say it with all my heart ! and I would 
die for the King's majesty and our Lord High iVd- 
miral, if they would but put away their evil and 
corrupt counsellors, and pay us our dues, and put 
our fleets in condition to drive these Dutch from 
our seas." 

b 2 



8 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

While Will Gaff was saying these words a tall, 
thin, sour-visaged sailor in the crowd said to some 
who were nearest to him, " Will is too mealy- 
mouthed ; what does he mean with his kings and 
dukes? will his god-blessings turn these tickets 
into dollars ? The King has fallen a thousand 
leagues to leeward of the path of righteousness ; 
he thinks of nothing but his misses ; and the Duke, 
though the head of the navy and Lord High Ad- 
miral, is little better than the King, and is a rank 
Papist to boot." Some of the men; who heard this 
sour speech assented to it with nods and shakes of 
the head and low groans ; but others whistled be- 
tween their teeth, and looked as if they thought 
that Joel Wyke was going a little too far in the 
wind's eye. 

Master Strong, the porter, being mollified by 
Will Gaff's last speech, said, in reply to it, that 
albeit their Honours were all away, Mr. Clerk 
Pepys was within, working hard, as was his wont, 
in his office ; and that it might be that he would 
condescend to talk with Will about the money- 
tickets, if Will would only come in alone. The 
frank-hearted seaman begged Strong to go and see 
how the Clerk stood affected. The porter closed 
the little grating and went into the interior of the 
building. While he was absent some of the sailors 
in the crowd said that they ought all to go in, 
and explain their great want, as they had done be- 
fore ; that the Clerk of the Navy ought to have an 
open ear for every honest man in the service. 
Others at the same time said that there ought to be 
at least a deputation, as one man for every ship's 
crew ; and the latter proposition was strongly 
urged by Joel Wyke, who was very proud of his 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. B 

speech-making abilities, and who, from his frequent 
exercise of them, had gotten the name of " Speaker 
Joel," together with the reputation of being quite 
a sea-lawyer. While Joel was haranguing in a loud 
shrill voice, and with a nasal twang which savoured 
strongly of the conventicle, Master Strong, the 
door-keeper, returned to the gate, and told Will 
Gaff, through the grating, that the clerk would see 
him. But Joel Wyke came to the wicket and told 
Master Strong that the sailors of the fleet did not 
think it fit to trust their case to the pleading of one 
young man, and had come to the resolution that a 
deputation must see Mr. Pepys and confer with 
him. The doorkeeper, who knew his man, said 
that this could not be, and that Joel was a pert 
knave for proposing it — yea, a pert knave and a 
fanatic. The sea-lawyer waxed very wroth, his 
face becoming as red as the deep yellow of his com- 
plexion would allow : he threatened assault and 
battery — spoke of pulling the porter's nose through 
the iron grating, of bursting open the wicket, of 
breaking down the big gate with sledge-hammers 
and axes ; but Will allayed the storm by proposing 
that, in lieu of a deputation of many seamen, Joel 
Wyke should be joined in commission with him, 
and that they two should go in and have speech 
with Mr. Pepys. The mob, who were evidently 
divided into two parties, the one looking to Gaff as 
their chief, and the other regarding Wyke in that 
light, soon agreed that they would be satisfied with 
this arrangement. Strong went again into the 
innermost part of the edifice, where Pepys was not 
writing, but trembling, for the official's nerves were 
not heroically strung ; and as none knew better 
than he the wrongs which had been done by a 



10 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

thoughtless, extravagant, and profligate govern- 
ment to the seamen of the royal navy, and the deep 
distress in which the sailors and their families had 
been lying for many, many months, he apprehended 
some act of violence from their desperation. It 
was a year ago or thereupon, since Pepys was terri- 
fied out of his wits, and almost deprived of his 
supper, by an insurrection of sailors' wives, who, to 
the number of three hundred and more, screamed 
for money to buy bread. Mrs, Pepys had a delicate 
venison pasty for supper that night, but was afraid 
to send it to the baker's to be baked, apprehending 
that the famishing women would offer violence to 
it. The pasty, however, was sent and brought 
back in safety — for Pepys was a lucky man. He, 
however, thought it better now to grant a parley 
than provoke a storm ; and he rather readily con- 
sented to receive the two deputies instead of one, 
but beseeched the porter, who was strong by nature 
as well as by name, to hold hard by the wicket 
when it was opened, and not admit more than those 
two. And, to support the janitor, Pepys sent his 
under-clerk Mr. Hater, who would much rather 
have seen his principal go himself. 

Not relying entirely upon his own great bodily 
strength, and counting for the little that it was worth' 
the assistance of the under-clerk, Strong, when he 
returned to the grating, made an appeal to the 
honour of the sailors, and concluded a paction with 
them, by which they agreed to keep on the other 
side of the street when the wicket should be 
opened to admit their two delegates. Upon these 
conditions, which were faithfully observed by the 
seamen, the wicket was unbarred, and Will Gaff 
and Joel Wyke were admitted. They stayed within 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. 11 

for a very long time, for Speaker Joel must needs 
make one of his longest speeches to the smart clerk, 
whose confusion and fright he much enjoyed. The 
mob outside became impatient, and began shouting 
and calling for Will and Joel with so loud a chorus 
that it could be heard in every part of the edifice. 
At last, as it was growing towards dusk, the two 
delegates came forth into the street. Will Gaff 
had a smile upon his face, betokening that he, upon 
the whole, was satisfied with the interview ; but 
Joel Wyke looked as sour as he did before he went 
in. The sailors gathered round them, eager to know 
what Mr. Pepys had said, and whether he gave 
them any immediate hope of getting their money, 
and fresh employment aboard. Will declared that 
Mr. Pepys was a very fine gentleman, and the 
sailors' friend ; that he was as sorry as they were 
themselves at having no money to give them, and 
no control over the navy-chest ; that he had pro- 
mised to speak not only with their Honours of the 
Board, but also with the Duke and the Lord High 
Admiral, and otherwise do all that he possibly could 
do in order to get the seamen's tickets changed into 
silver coin ; and hoped that before the world was a 
week older all their just demands would be satisfied, 
and profitable employment found for them on board 
the King's ships in the Medway. " His Honour," 
subjoined Gaff, " saith that he worketh hard for the 
navy, and hath but little pay or emolument himself; 
that he is but a poor man who began the world with 
nothing, and is still struggling with difficulties, find- 
ing it very hard to make the two ends meet. Never- 
theless he hath put his hand into his pocket, like 
a gentleman as he is, and hath given me a golden 
jacobus, wherewith I propose that we adjourn to the 



12 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

Anchor tavern and drink his honour's health, 
though it be but In a drop of drink a man." 

Very different was the harangue of Speaker Joel. 
That sea-lawyer declared that no good had been 
done ; that no faith was to be put in the promises 
of a fawning, wheedling, coat-turning rogue like 
Pepys, who cared not how many honest and 
righteous sailors starved, provided he could enrich 
himself by partaking in the plunder, and furnish 
himself amply with the means of gratifying his 
passion for fine clothes, fine company, ungodly 
plays, masques, and dances, and other unholy 
sports, which had been put down and prohibited 
in the days when there was a just judge in Israel, 
or when this land was governed according to the 
Gospel, in wisdom and righteousness. " We," 
subjoined Joel, " we misused mariners, who have 
shed our blood in battle, have jackets that are 
tattered and torn, and few of us have any shirts 
under our jackets, or any shoes to our feet ; but 
this servant of the navy, who is appointed and paid 
by the country only to take care of our interests, is 
clad like Dives in fine linen and costly raiment ; 
he walks about the world in velvets and satins and 
silks, with all the new-fangled fopperies brought 
over from France : the very wig on his head hath 
cost more money than the Wapping Jews would 
give us for all our clothes put together. The 
price is monstrous ! the wig itself is monstrous ! 
It comes from that land of papistry and idolatry 
where men be satisfied with nothing that nature 
sends them ; where men cut off their own hair in 
order to wear the hair of other people. Yerily 
this peruke, or periwig, smells as strongly of 
Popery as the devil does of brimstone. Nothing 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. 13 

can go well with England or with us so long as 
the chief clerk to the navy wears such a wig. 
Verily it is curled, and twisted, and powdered, 
and bulged out, so as to look like a lion's mane. 
But we have never beaten the Dutch since these 
French wigs came among us ! TTe poor sailors 
may be as hungry as we are naked, but Mr. 
Secretary fares sumptuously every day, feasting 
at home with that fine city madam his wife, or 
feasting in ordinaries or cook-shops, with dissolute 
cavalieros, and robbers of the nation like himself. 
And yet for all this outlay he is very rich. How 
greatly, therefore, must he rob the navy and us 
poor mariners ! Without fearing the fate of 
Ananias, he swore unto me that he is poor — very 
poor ; that he hath no money to give ; and that at 
this moment the coffers of the Admiralty be en- 
tirely empty. He hath given unto Will Gaff (for 
my part I scorned the gift) one jacobus to be divided 
among ye all that be here. This will not make a 
farthing a-piece if the coin is a good one ; and I 
have my suspicions that it may be clipped. TTe 
must deal otherwise with this Mr. Pepys, and with 
those who aie above him, than we have hitherto 
done, or we shall get not a rap of our pay, but be 
left starving as we are with these tickets, which 
Beelzebub invented, in our hands or pockets. But 
what do I say, pockets ? — there is no having 
pockets without having clothes, and we shall soon 
have neither jacket, vest, nor breeches. Ah, my 
shipmates ! Ah, my brethren all ! it was not thus 
with us in the by -gone days, when we were regu- 
larly paid, not in paper, but in cash ; when we had 
plenty of clothes, and plenty of pockets, and pockets 
well-lined with piastres, reals, and doubloons, taken 

b 3 



14 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

from the idolatrous Spaniards and the other wor- 
shippers of the scarlet whore of Rome ! But there 
was holiness then in the land and in this court of 
England ; no Sabbath-breaking was allowed either 
at sea or ashore, and therefore were our arms always 
blessed, and therefore did we never storm a place 
on the Spanish Main without taking it, with great 
booty to ourselves, and a great slaughter of the 
Papishes. I sailed with Captain Sawkins in the 
Gulf of Panama, when he blew out a man's brains 
on the quarter-deck for only touching a dice-box 
on the Lord's Day." 

"Stop, Joel Wyke!" cried one of Will Gars 
party. " Hold hard there ! That Sawkins thou 
namest of was a blue-light, a canting, psalm-singing 
son of — what I won't mention, and nothing else 
but a flibusteer and robber ! We have had enough, 
O Joel, of thy hard bundle of oakum, so let Will 
Gaff spin us a yarn !" 

But the sea-speaker would not be stopped, and 
being enraged at the interruption and at the pre- 
ference given by many to the oratory of Gaff, he 
went on more furiously than ever. While he was 
ranting and foaming at the mouth (ranting and 
foaming the more because many of Gaffs friends 
whewed and whistled at him), the shades of evening 
closed in, and the uproarious London apprentices 
broke loose from their shops, warehouses, and work- 
shops ; and many of them came trooping down to 
Crutched-friars, in the hope of enjoying a good 
sailor riot, and of joining in it out of sheer love 
of mischief. These mad -cap apprentices, indeed, 
sought the scene of disturbance as anxiously as the 
older and sedater citizens avoided it. They all 
knew the cause of complaint, for the government 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. 15 

had been paying the seamen of the royal navy with 
tickets instead of cash ever since the first year of 
the Restoration of Charles II., and there had been 
many riots before this present one. As the lads 
arrived they shouted, " Well done, sailors ! get 
change for your tickets ! Make the rogues in the 
big house swallow them and give you gold for 
them ! On, on, shipmen ! the London 'prentices 
be coming." Although he loved not their frolick- 
some humour, and had often moaned in the spirit 
over the lightness of conversation and behaviour of 
these young denizens of the city, who, like other 
and higher parts of the nation, seemed determined 
to make up for lost time, and to take a full swing 
of frolic and pleasure, which had been so long 
interdicted by the Presbyterians and Puritans, Joel 
^Yyke nevertheless was not sorry to see their 
arrival, and, like all mob-orators and club-men, he 
became the bolder as the number of his auditors 
increased. 

" I say," said the sea-lawyer, " that the clerk to 
the navy, in there, is a godless rogue that ought to 
be hanged ! I say that they are all rogues together, 
selling and trafficking in places, filling the navy- 
office, the victualling-office, the dockyards, and all 
other offices connected with the service, with cheats 
and thieves, who defraud and plunder, or with fools, 
who know not how to perform their duty. They 
have all been feathering their nests, while the navy 
has been getting deeper and deeper into debt. 
They have all been wallowing in luxury and sin, 
while we have been starving. They and their 
fellows have sold the country to France, and are 
going to bring in Popery as well as perukes from 
France. Our stomachs are empty, and our religion 



16 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

is in danger. The Lord hath already visited the 
land and this great city with fearful judgments ; 
but there are those who will not be warned even 
by fire and plague ; their wickedness hath become 
daily more wicked; they have persecuted God's 
few faithful people for raising their voices against 
the sins of the time, for interpreting God's word 
and the prophecies of the saints, and for calling 
upon the land to repent in sackcloth and wishes ; 
and therefore judgments still more terrible than 
those we have lately witnessed are close at hand. 
Tom of the Woods has said it ; and ye all know 
by experience how true a prophet is Tom. After 
these judgments we shall have the reign of the 
saints upon earth ; but, shipmates, how are we to 
live until that happy time if the navy-office pay us 
not ? Shipmates, what shall we do — what is to be 
done ?" 

11 1 wish," said one of the many saucy apprentices, 
" I wish you would leave off preaching and be a- 
doing of something. We came here for fun, and 
not to hear a conventicle discourse about judgments 
and your fifth monarchy ! Let me tell you what 
to do by way of making a profitable or a merry 
beginning — break open that black gate, catch Clerk 
Pepys, and make him empty the strong boxes, and 
give you money for the tickets ; and if he will not 
or cannot do it, why, carry him across the hill, and 
throw him into the Tower ditch, periwig and all. 
A good ducking will do the clerk no harm — his 
business is with the water ; and I say duck, but not 
drown him !" 

Poor Pepys heard this ribald speech of the Lon- 
don 'prentice with his own ears, for, being anxious 
to get home to his own house, he had come to the 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. 17 

wicket to peep through a corner of the grating 
and see whether the mob were dispersing or not, 
and at this moment he and his man Hater had 
their ears close to the grating. The secretary's 
feelings were not to be envied : it was a cold, raw, 
blowing evening of March, such as no man would 
choose for a bathe in Thames water ; the seamen 
had not collected for a mere frolic like the appren- 
tices, and some of the more desperate or fanatic 
sailors might think drowning more applicable to 
his case than ducking ; he might be drowned with- 
out their intending it, as many a good man had 
been killed in wild mischievous sport ; and if 
his life should be saved, his fine clothes would be 
spoiled and lost for ever ; and to Mr. Pepys his 
fine clothes were as a part of himself, as members 
and portions of his own living sentient body, nay 
as part and parcel of his own soul. And to make 
the stroke the keener, Pepys had on him this day 
the most costly and best of his attire ; for Jie too 
had intended to go westward to the Mall to see the 
Royal sport, and, what would have pleased him 
more, all the fine- dressed lords and ladies, and 
bewitching king's mistresses, and he had only been 
prevented from going by the little accident that 
every soul in or connected with the Navy-office, 
except Hater his clerk, and Strong the janitor, 
had taken their departure thitherward before him, 
leaving the offices all empty and some important 
work to be done. He had equipped himself in his 
largest and newest periwig, his best peach-blos- 
somed velvet coat, and his violet-coloured camlet 
cloak with silver buttons ; and Mrs. Pepys had said 
that morning at his going out, that she had never 
seen him look grander, or more like himself. To 



18 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

have all these gallantries spoiled in their first 
bloom, and in all their freshness, and before he 
had received the compliments of his friends upon 
the one half of them — (the Duke of York had paid 
a studied eulogy to his wig, but that was some 
years ago, when he appeared for the first time at 
court in his periwig, and that periwig was nothing 
in dimension and make to this periwig) — to have 
wig, coat, cloak, and all the rest of his exquisite 
toilet hurled into the mud and water of the Tower 
ditch, was too distracting to think of. This cruel 
fate might, however, have befallen both the clothes 
and their wearer, but for the good, kind heart of 
Will Gaff, and the moderation of Will's immediate 
followers. Speaker Joel would fain have broken 
open the gate, as he had no faith in the clerk's 
word, and firmly believed some strong boxes he 
had seen in his office must contain money. Joel 
was also impelled by a strong political and re- 
ligious hatred against all men now in office, and 
indeed against every man that preferred the present 
kingly government to the government of the saints. 
But AVill Gaff, who had no such inveterate feeling, 
and who looked to no other millennium than that of 
getting paid for the past, and service and pay for 
the future, and who both believed that Pepys had 
told the truth, and that nothing but disgrace could 
be got by breaking open the gate and the strong 
boxes, and laying hands of violence upon the clerk, 
made a short, sound, and sailor-like speech, which 
was much applauded by his own party and by the 
'prentice boys, and even by some of the sour sort 
who followed Joel Wyke. He made a great deal 
of the golden jacobus which Pepys had given him 
out of his own private pocket ; and he ended his 



THE NAVY-OFFICE. 19 

speech by proposing that they should give three 
cheers for the open-handed clerk. WilFs own 
friends gave tongue immediately, and the city 
apprentices joined them, not one of them shouting 
more heartily than the frolicsome youth who had 
proposed ducking Pepys in the Tower ditch. 
Except a few, who could not resist the force of 
example, and who remained to finish the three 
cheers for the clerk, JoelWyke's people took their 
departure, some going to their own hungry lodg- 
ings, but more repairing to a secret conventicle or 
meeting-house in the vicinity of RatclifTe-highway, 
where, notwithstanding all the severity of the 
Government, and the terrible proclamations which 
had frequently been acted upon, a crowd of fanatics 
assembled night after night to listen to preachers 
more hot-brained than themselves ; to pray for 
another revolution and civil war, and the establish- 
ment of the fifth-monarchy men ; and to concert 
wild and ferocious, but impracticable schemes of 
insurrection. Will Gaff and his party, resolving 
to wait with as much patience as they could for 
another week, went straight to the Anchor tavern 
in Wapping, to spend the jacobus and perhaps a 
little more, to drink the clerk's health, and give a 
toast for the fulfilment of his promise at the week's 
end. A good many of the apprentices went with 
them, and clubbed their pence with them, and got 
quit of their superfluous vivacity by fighting with 
the night-watch on Tower-hill, and breaking some 
Jews' windows in Rosemary-lane. The rest of the 
hopes of the city strolled away to Moorfields to see 
a match of bear-baiting by torch-light. 

About an hour after they had all dispersed from 
Crutched-friars, and a full half- hour after Mr. Pepys 



20 



THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 



had got safely from- the Navy-office to his own 
house and loving spouse, a company of King's 
Guards arrived from the Tower to suppress the 
riot, and, finding nothing to do, they marched 
quietly back again. Nearly everything in the 
kingdom was in a condition of negligence and 
unreadiness. At the court end of town every- 
thing seemed to be a jest, and was treated as such ; 
at the east end, and more particularly among the 
sailors, there was poverty, discontent, disaffection, 
fanaticism, and treason. No marvel was it there- 
fore that the flag of England was on the eve of 
sustaining a never to be forgotten disgrace. 



( 21 ) 



CHAPTER II. 

THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 

It is but a short step from the Navy-office in 
Crutched -friars to Seething-lane, in the parish of 
St. Olave, Hart-street, where there is a good sub- 
stantial dwelling-house. The door is carefully 
closed and locked, and the lower windows, open- 
ing upon the street, are well secured by iron bars. 
It is but a turbulent neighbourhood, being so near 
to Wapping and BatclifTe-highway, and these are 
extra- turbulent times, when it behoves every cau- 
tious man to look well to his own house. If he 
does not, he must expect but little protection from 
the laws and the authorities that be. Without 
forcing lock or breaking bar, and without calling 
upon the aid of sprite or witch, we can enter this 
well-guarded house and descry its occupants and 
furniture. Walk in with us, gentle reader. 

We cross an entrance-hall, paved with flag- 
stones, and ascend a good, broad, open staircase, 
with balustrades of oak, quaintly carved and nicely 
polished. On the first landing-place a door faces 
us. The door is closed and locked like the street- 
door, and although it is now the warm and genial 
month of June, there is a heavy curtain, or hanging, 
made of green serge and wadded, closely drawn on 
the inner side of the door — for servants (and there 
are four or five in the offices below) have a wicked 



22 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

habit of peeping through keyholes, and of listening 
to what their betters are about ; and those within 
the room have been doing some things which they 
would not have seen, and are now saying many 
things which they would not have heard by any 
one. But to our natural magic the strong oaken 
door flies open, the heavy-wadded hanging lifts 
itself to let us pass, and we stand in the middle of 
the room, unheard and unseen. On great occasions 
it is the dining-room of the house, and a very com- 
fortable room it is. The walls are covered with 
green serge, with gilt leather for borders ; the 
ceiling, though not very lofty, is neatly painted, 
and is crossed by two massy beams of oak curiously 
carved ; the floor is covered partly with a neat 
mat, and partly with a soft and richly coloured 
Turkey carpet. We have had our wars and 
troubles, and some retrograde steps in taste and 
letters since the days of Queen Elizabeth, but here 
is evidence that we are advancing in domestic 
comfort and the commoner arts. The matting is 
a great improvement upon loose rushes ; the carpet 
is a step indeed ! Yet are there still some things 
in this furnishing which appear in our eyes rather 
clumsy and uncouth. These great heavy chests, 
or trunks, at the sides of the room, bound with 
strong iron bindings, and secured (when they are 
shut, for they are open now) with clumsy locks and 
great padlocks, are not such things as we would 
keep our plate, table-linen, and fine clothes in ; 
nor is this room the place where we would maga- 
zine those stores and treasures. That looking-glass 
over the mantel -piece, into which a busy lady is 
now and then peeping, is but small and dingy, and 
seems to be warped ; the grate beneath for holding 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 23 

the sea-coal fire when the weather demands it, is 
very wide, rough, and slovenly ; these heavy chairs 
demand the strength of a porter to move them ; 
the huge tables seem fixtures, altogether immoveable, 
and though they are polished there is a good deal 
of dust upon them. But the capital finish given 
by neatness and the perfection of cleanliness is 
almost everywhere wanting. What has that flannel 
wrapper to do upon that settee by the window? 
Why are these loose habiliments of man and woman 
scattered about ? At one end of the room there is 
a door opening into an inner apartment — the door 
is wide open, allowing the eye to rest upon sundry 
objects which ought not to be seen. There is also 
much litter, or a huddling together of accessories, 
in the larger room where we are standing. Some 
of these things, however, betoken the business and 
taste of the occupants. There are mixed together 
confusedly, musical instruments and mathematical 
instruments ; music- books and maps and charts ; 
books of drawings and books of accounts ; play -bills, 
hand-ballads, and sermons ; a large mariner's com- 
pass and a ' nativity ' cast by Xilly, the great 
living astrologer ; a pair of globes and sundry mo- 
dels of ships and boats ; a warming-pan and a big 
case-clock ; a prayer-book and a pair of spurs ; two 
riding- whips, and three vizards or masks for the 
lady to wear at the playhouse or upon other occa- 
sions ; a pill-box for the gentleman, who is rather 
a valetudinarian, often complaining of a disorder 
in his eyes, and a thin japan box containing black 
patches for the lady — for since the Castlemaine set 
the fashion at court (having first borrowed it from 
the French) every lady of any fashion wears a black 
patch or two on her face as an indispensable part of 



24 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. ' 

the toilette. Many other objects there are huddled 
together ; but we must turn our attention from the 
inanimate to the animate. 

\ Opposite to each other, lolling upon high-backed 
chairs, and looking as if they are heated and fatigued 
by some recent exertion, are a lady and gentleman. 
Header, we introduce you to Mr. and Mrs. Pepys. 
There is another chair turned towards the window, 
with the redundant curls of a wig flowing down its 
straight back : it might be taken for a second gen- 
tleman, but it is only Pepys' periwig hung there, 
for his readiness in going out. Except when enter- 
taining company Pepys wears no periwig at home, 
but only a velvet cap. Taking him as he now is, 
without his ambrosial locks or flowing mane, he is 
but a mean or common-looking mortal. His dress 
too is rather slovenly, for in these days people wear 
fine clothes and clean linen only when they go 
abroad, and throw them off for the sake of economy 
as soon as ever they return home. The Clerk of 
the Acts of the Navy is about thirty-five years 
old, but looks older. He has a better face now 
than he had at a later period when Sir Godfrey 
Kneller painted his portrait ; yet we cannot call it 
a pleasing face, and it is very far from being a 
handsome one. The best thing about it is an ex- 
pression of ease and good temper ; but he looks 
cunning withal, and has an habitual twitching up 
of the nose, which makes him appear as if he were 
always smelling something disagreeable. There is 
no mistaking by his countenance that he is a 
shrewd, clever, subtle, and adroit man, who has 
thriven in the world and will yet thrive, who will v 
permit no delicate scruples to retard his advance- 
ment. His wife is seven or eight years younger 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 26 

than himself, and looks still younger. A comely- 
and handsome blonde she is ! and if she has rather 
too much embonpoint, no flesh can be fairer or 
more transparent than hers. She has a most happy, 
heart -at-ease, enjoying- countenance, only slightly 
tinged with vanity, and with the spirit of worldly 
calculation, which her husband and her worldly 
experience have put upon her. She is almost as 
negligent in her in-door attire as Mr. Clerk him- 
self, and it grieves us to say that her stockings are 
dirty, and her slippers down at heel. But this 
lonely in-door state is their chrysalis or grub state. 
You should see Mr. and Mrs. Pepys out of doors 
in the Park, or on the Mall, or in the playhouse ! 

' ; Pepys," says the lady, speaking first, as became 
her sex, after a short silence, " well Pepys, we 
have done a good morning's work, and have the 
satisfaction of knowing that all is right according to 
inventory — that plate money . . . . " 

The Clerk of the Acts lays a finger perpendi- 
cularly across his lips, and saith — " Bessy, my 
darling, speak a little lower." 

" Tut," says the lady, " the stuffed hanging is to 
the door, the windows are all shut, these walls have 
no ears ! Mr. Pepys, methinks you are a trifle 
over-cautious and timid since the fright you got 
last March at the Navy-office." 

" Bessy, love," says Pepys, in what is almost a 
whisper, " with so much money in the house, and 
so much plate and costly gear, one cannot be too 
cautious, in troublesome times like these, when 
government and people seem alike determined to 
take whatever they can come at by the strong 
hand." 

" Most true : but we have been, and we are, care 



26 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

ful enough. The servants have no inkling of the 
coined gold and silver that lie here : nor do they 
know of one-fourth part of the plate which we 
possess. Pepys, it gladdens my heart to think of 
it ! Fifty silver spoons, besides ladles ; two dozen 
silver dishes, six silver salvers ; and then the silver 
lamps and candlesticks, and all the rest. Three 
thousand pounds in coined gold, and more than five 
hundred pounds in silver ! Up heart, Samuel 
Pepys, and be merry, for are we not thriving 
apace !" 

41 We are thriving, and for that I am merry, and 
thank God ; but the State, Mrs. Pepys, the State 
is going to ruin, and for that I am sad." 

44 But, Samuel Pepys, the State is not you and 
I ; if the State will not take care of itself, as we 
take care of ourselves, why to ruin it must go ! 
We shall soon be rich enough to do without it." 

44 If we could but keep that which we have 
gotten. But that would be hard to do, my Bessy." 

44 Well, then, Pepys, the State shall not be 
ruined at all. It is not ruined yet, long as they 
have been talking about it. The fire of London 
was to finish our overthrow, but a year hath 
scarcely past, and the city is already rising from 
its ashes, richer and more stately than before. 
Let croakers croak, and fanatics give out prophe- 
cies — I believe it will all come to nothing, and 
that the country and state, and you and I, dear 
Pepys, will continue to go on much as we have 
been doing." 

44 I could hope so too, were not all things in 
court and government so completely out of joint. 
The King minds nothing but his pleasures, and 
though the Duke attends to business, he has no 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 27 

head for it, and fancies he has. That fifth- 
monarchy rascal, Joel Wyke, said a good deal 
that was true, and, in his ignorance, left unsaid 
many things that are more dreadful, and quite as 
true. We are at war both with France and Hol- 
land, and the Dutch fleets are beating ours in 
almost every encounter." 

" But," says Mrs. Pepys, interrupting him, " the 
Dutch fleets can 't come to London ; and this our 
good house in Seething-lane will not go to sea, or 
fall in their way— -so we need not care a Dutch 
herring about them." 

Pepys, without heeding his wife, continues— - 
" Our navy is in the saddest state, having never 
been properly paid since the downfall of old Noll's 
government. The want of money puts all things 
out of order, but above all the navy, in which our 
greatest strength and glory once consisted ; and 
the King keeps on spending, and his ministers 
keep on cheating and robbing." 

" The more honour to you, Samuel Pepys, for 
saving so much, and robbing so very, very little." 

"Nay," quoth the Clerk of the Acts, "I rob 
not at all." 

" Nay," says the lady with a laugh, " do not 
frown, Samuel ; but I sometimes cannot quite make 
out the difference between robbing and the taking 
of fees and perquisites." 

" I will explain it some other time," saith Pepys, 
who then continues his discourse — " Our office is 
in an abyss of debt ; our ship -yards are empty ; 
there is no discipline left in the fleet ; every day 
brings news of fresh mutinies among the seamen, 
who can get no wages, who know how they are 
defrauded, and who will not fight with any heart. 



28 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

The men, also, have been brought to despise their 
officers upon other grounds. Promotions have 
been hurriedly made by my Lady Castlemaine and 
the King's favourites and courtiers : the veteran 
officers, the hardy and experienced men trained to 
the sea -service from their childhood, — the officers 
who beat French, Dutch, and Spaniards wherever 
they met them, and who made Europe tremble at 
the name of old Noll, or of the Commonwealth, — 
have been driven out of the service in disgust, or 
have been put upon the shelf in order to make 
room for young lordlings and land-bred cavalieros, 
who have never seen blue water in their lives, and 
who are as ignorant of the sea and its navigation, 
and of all that concerns the sea, as I am innocent 
of witchcraft. You shall find more than half of 
the officers of a first-rate ship laid in their berths 
all at one time through sea-sickness, and incapable 
of standing on the quarter-deck from the day the 
ship leaves port until she returns to it." 

Here the lively Mrs. Pepys, who never could 
listen patiently to a long discourse, exclaims, — 
" Poor dear Lords, how much they must surfer ! 
I think that the sea-nausea is the worst of all sick- 
nesses, and that the man who invented the first 
ship ought to have been sunk with it to the bottom 
of the sea. What says that charming, naughty, 
winning, wicked fellow Lord Buckhurst in the new 
song that is just out ? — 

* To all you ladies now on land, 

We men at sea indite ; 
But first would have you understand 

How hard it is to write ; 
The Muses, now, and Neptune too, 
We must implore to write to you. 

With a fa, la, la, la, la." 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 29 

" Mrs. Pepys," says the Clerk, " you are a little 
out of tune in that song. I wish you would take a 
lesson from Knipp." 

" Samuel Pepys, I wish you would not always 
be a-nipping me with your slut Knipp." And 
having said these words, the lady allows her hus- 
band to proceed. 

" 'T is all very well to w r rite verses, Bessy dear, 
and to tell you ladies how their paper, pen, and 
ink roll up and down their ships at sea ; but offi- 
cers who take charge of ships ought to be able to 
be up and doing, which these young fops are not : 
and then their respect and subordination to their 
superiors in command ! these young sparks will 
challenge their captains, nay, the very admirals of 
the fleet. A rake-helly set are they, and for ever 
quarrelling and duel-fighting, or swearing, tearing, 
and blaspheming, or gambling, or — or doing worse. 
When such are the officers, what must be the 
men? Mrs. Pepys, I tell you there is no disci- 
pline left, no respect in the sailors for their offi- 
cers ; and, instead of respect and loyalty, scorn 
and hatred for the King and Government they 
serve. And then the perils and fearful losses that 
we are sustaining through the rashness and igno- 
rance of our sea-captains. Our ships founder in 
smooth water, are capsized by a cap of w r ind, and 
are run ashore in clear weather. The captains 
and lieutenants, who know nothing, will not be 
advised by the pilots, and are always swearing that 
they will run them through the body if they will 
not carry them where they choose to order — 
though to do so would be ruin to the ship. The 
blasphemy is terrible, and drives out of the ships 
all the more serious part of the mariners. Com- 

c 



30 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

missioner Middleton says that one might believe 
that the devil is chief commander of our fleets, so 
much wickedness is there of all sorts. The scared 
old Roundheads, who fought so bravely for Noll, 
cannot stand it, but desert, and come home, and 
declare that the end of the world must be ap- 
proaching. Captain Guy, who knows his business, 
says that the whole navy is governed by a com- 
pany of fools who will ruin it entirely ; that the 
Dutch do fight in very good order, and we in none 
at all ; that even the true English valour seems 
almost spent and worn out ; and that many of our 
sailors are declaring that they w r ould rather fight 
for the Dutch than against them ; and that they 
will not fight at all, nor so much as weigh anchor 
until they be paid. The crews of four ships mu- 
tiny in one day -at the Nore. These are sad con- 
siderations, while so many of the enemy's ships are 
triumphing in the sea. Oh ! how many ships be 
lost already ! And well may we lose them, since 
flag-officers themselves be so ignorant of seamar— 
ship as not to know which tack loses the wind or 
keeps it. There is a young land sea-lord that I 
know that knoweth not the difference between lar- 
board and starboard, and port- helm and helm-a- 
lee." 

" Mr. Pepys," says the lady, " I think you are 
singing out of tune, and time, and place. What 
can I understand of your larboards and starboards, 
and rigmarole ?" 

The clerk perceiving that his wife had been 
ruffled by his criticism upon her singing, pays 
great flattering compliment to her judgment in i 
other matters, and telling her that she has a head 
to understand anything that she chooses to listen to, 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 31 

he continues : — " The King can get no money any- 
where unless he call the parliament forthwith, and 
parliaments he hates and fears. There is no vic- 
tualling" the ships for any long cruise — no paying 
the men (many of the King's officers have not been 
paid these four years), no trusting them even if 
they were properly commanded ; and so for these 
and other weighty reasons, and on account of our 
many disasters at sea, it is now resolved to keep 
our fleets at home, to fortify our harbours, and to 
trust for our defence to a few land-troops, our 
untrained militia, and our land-forts. But our 
harbours will not be fortified in time ; our land- 
forts are as badly furnished as our ships ; and 
though every moment is precious, everything is 
put off till to-morrow. The officers of the ord- 
nance now in employment be as foolish and per- 
verse as those of the navy, and not a whit more 
honest. In short, Mrs. Pepys, all things are turned 
topsy-turvy, and the country is in a disorganized 
helpless condition. While our great fleet is lying 
at the Hope, and up the Med way by Chatham, the 
French and Dutch are giving the law in the Chan- 
nel, and insulting our coasts with ships of war and 
fire-ships. The King and the Duke are going 
some day to go to Sheerness to look after the forti- 
fications meant to defend the entrance into the 
Med way ; but a match at tennis, a dance at the 
court, a new play, a new pretty face, anything is 
allowed to prevent their going ; and when they go 
they will do nothing ; for there is no money ! no 
money ! The King can no longer get clothes for 
his own back : the grooms of the chamber sweep 
his wardrobe at the end of their monthly services, 
and the mercers and tailors have such long heavy 

c 2 



32 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

bills owing to them that they will give no more 
trust until they be paid." 

" Sad ! sad, indeed !" says the lady. " My heart 
aches for the merry King . . . But, la ! Pepys, only 
to think that you and I should have plenty of fine 
clothes when the King of England can get none ! " 

" And, Bessy, he is as ill- furnished with other 
commodities. The other day, at the council-table, 
there was not a scrap of writing-paper for his 
Majesty's use. The King was vexed at this. Sir 
Richard Browne told his Majesty he would call 
the person whose work it was to provide the paper : 
the man being come, told his Majesty that he was 
but a poor man, that he was out of pocket four 
hundred or five hundred pounds for paper, which 
was as much as he is worth ; and that he cannot 
provide it any longer without money, not having 
received a penny since the King's coming in. And 
Mr. Evelyn tells me of several of the menial ser- 
vants of the court lacking bread, from not having 
received a farthing of wages, since his Majesty's 
happy restoration seven years ago." 

" The more thankful ought we to be to Provi- 
dence for our own good fortune and present riches. 
Samuel Pepys, you take these matters too much to 
heart. All may end well yet. They say the King 
must call a parliament, and then he will get money 
and pay his poor people — whom Heaven protect in 
the meanwhile ! — and satisfy the mutinous sailors, 
and put the State in order. You thought you 
would never get it, and yet you got money enough 
to keep your promise with the sailors that besieged 
you last March in the Navy -office. You were 
born under a lucky star, Pepys, or you and I should i 
not be as we now are." 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 33 

" I only got money enough to redeem half the 
tickets held by those two companies of men. I 
expect every day to see that incarnate devil Joel 
Wyke and his crew back again ; and other many 
hundreds who have had no money at all." 

" But, Pepys, I tell you they will get it when 
the parliament assembles. " 

" Before that happens the Dutch and the French 
and the fanatics, among them, may spoil all." 

" But the King has sent to ask for a peace, and 
the French King is tired of this war ; and the 
Dutch say they are ready to listen to terms." 

" When a country sues for peace from being 
unable to carry on war, it can expect no terms but 
such as are ruinous or dishonourable." 

" But we will get the peace and be quiet, and 
recover our losses, and wipe out our disgraces at 
some more favourable juncture. England cannot 
be long depressed ; things cannot remain in the 
state they are now in." 

" I fear that it is only a revolution that can 
mend them." 

" "Well, Pepys, and what then? You have 
thrived under one revolution, and may prosper 
under another. When we were first married, and 
you were beginning to stir in the world, you saw 
nothing but ruin to yourself and patron in the 
death of Oliver and the overthrow of the Common- 
wealth ; but Oliver died, the Commonwealth was 
overthrown, and from that moment you began to 
rise in the world ; and now you are a rich man, 
and your patron, from a simple knight, has become 
Earl of Sandwich." 

Pepys smiles as he says that this is most true ; 
and from this moment his spirits brighten, and his 



34 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

thoughts run into another channel. He forgets 
the misfortunes of his country, and thinks only of 
his own prosperity and aggrandizement. This is 
a very common habit with him — not that Pepys 
does not love his country, but that he loves Samuel 
Pepys more. After whistling part of an air, and 
singing part of the song — 

" Great, good, and just, could I but rate 
My grief, and thy too rigid fate I" 

the words of which were written by Montrose, and 
the music by Pepys himself (since the Restoration), 
for Pepys is an accomplished English musician, 
he smiles again, and more radiantly than before, 
and then saith, in a voice pitched in altogether a 
different key from the despondent tone in which 
he had been talking, " Well, Bessy, darling, when 
I think of all the past, I do really believe that I 
was born under a happy star. Doctor Lilly, you 
know, hath often told me so ; and though Lilly 
doth predict so as to please his friends, and those 
who pay him best, and so as to keep in with the 
times, he assuredly hath made some marvellously 
true hits." 

u A fig for Lilly and his astrology ! I can tell 
you as well as he that you have la belle etoile, and 
' pour eire heureux bel astre suffit ' — which means 
(for you know not French quite so well as you 
ought to do), to be lucky, nothing is wanting but a 
good star . . . / " 

" And prudence, Bessy, darling, a little prudence 
and circumspection. Well ! as we began life twelve 
years ago with nothing, we must have been lucky. 
You were little more than fifteen, and just out of a 
foreign convent, I twenty-three, the son of a tailor 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 35 

in Cheapside, with a small business and a large 
family. I had nothing but my Saint Paul's school 
and Cambridge education, and the patronage of the 
Earl of Sandwich, then Admiral to old Noll, and 
plain Sir Edward Montague.' ' 

" It was a bold venture, truly," says Mrs. 
Pepys ; " but love does wonders — V amour fait des 
miracles" 

- " Do you remember, love, how joyous we were 
when my Lord gave us a room in one of his out- 
houses, and found me some work in copying papers 
and writing letters for him ? Do you remember 
how you used to make coal fires, and wash my foul 
clothes for me with your own fair young hands? 
Poor, pretty wretch ! 't was up early with thee 
then, and none to help thee in thy toils — no, not 
so much as a wench of the smallest ! I had but 
three shirts then and two homely ruffs. It was 
hard living with us then, Mrs. Pepys !" 

" Very hard, and too hard to be borne, Mr. 
Pepys ; had it not been for my youth and the af- 
fection that was between us." 

" Ah, Bessy ! youth is all gold, and first love 
the first of jewels. There be times when I fancy I 
was happier then than I now am. 

1 The world was then so light, 
I hardly felt the weight ; — 
Joy ruled the day, and love the night/ 

There is more pleasure, Mrs. Pepys, in the strug- 
gle—that is, when we are young — than there is 
enjoyment in what the struggle gives us !" 

" Yes, Samuel, but as we cannot be young 
again, I am glad that the toil and doubt are over." 

" Still," continues the Clerk of the Acts, " I 
like to think of the past. And you have not forgot- 



36 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

ten how, only seven years ago, when fortune had 
begun to treat us a little^more kindly, we lived in 
the garret in Axe Yard, with our servant wench 
Jane, and no other in family ; and how you dressed 
the remains of a turkey for dinner on New Year's 
day, and in the doing of it burned your hands. 
By my soul, Bessy, I love you the better for these 
memories of the distressed and pinching times. No 
concerts then, Bessy, no dances, no plays for us — 
except once or twice, mayhap, in the course of the 
year ! No fine clothes as yet. I had but two 
cloth coats in the world, and that grey jackanapes 
coat with the black bindings I was fain to make 
last for Sundays and holidays for three whole 
years/' 

" Ay, and when my brother, after half-starving 
at home, went to seek his fortune in the Low 
Countries, we cut up that jackanapes coat and 
your old camlet cloak to fit him out, and gave him 
ten shillings in money that he might start in the 
world like a gentleman." 

" Pardon, Bessy, 't was not the jackanapes coat 
with the black bindings that I gave your brother, 
but my old close-bodied light-coloured cloth coat, 
with a gold edging to each seam, that said gold 
lace being somewhat thin and tarnished, for 'twas 
the very lace of the best petticoat you had when 
we were married." 

" Well, Samuel," says the corrected spouse, 
" your memory is better than mine, and I do sup- 
pose you have got it down in your diary. But to 
my story; when you gave the coat and the ten 
shillings to my brother to go seek his fortune 
among the Dutch, it was about that time you 
found we had gotten together, all debts being paid. 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 37 

nearly one hundred pounds, for which we thanked 
God, never having hoped at one time to have so 
much money." 

" That, Bessy, was about the time that you first 
began to wear black patches, and that Mr. Pin, 
the tailor, brought home my velvet coat and velvet 
cap, the first that ever I had. Well ! we certainly 
have continued to thrive, and to thank God, there- 
fore. I got a black silk suit shortly after my velvet 
coat ; and, at the end of that year, though the 
debts of the Navy were swollen to three hundred 
and seventy-four thousand pounds, I found myself 
about five hundred pounds clear in the world, and 
thanked God for it." 

" And pray, Samuel, my beloved, what was it 
you said was shown by your book accounts this 
year ?" 

" We have been buying and spending, Bessy ; 
we have been buying and spending our money very 
freely these last twelve months ; we have been 
almost exorbitant in our pleasure and pastimes and 
in our purchases of fine clothes : but still have we 
not done amiss on the getting and saving side of 
the book. As we are only at the beginning of the 
month of June, I cannot square for this year ; but 
hand me my diary, love, and I will decipher and 
read for you the entry I made on the thirty-first of 
December last." 

" Do, Samuel ; it is as musical to my ear as one 
of Pureell's, or one of thine own sweetest songs ;" 
and, so saying, the lady rises and brings from 
some corner in the inner room a manuscript book. 

Pepys opens the book, and reads from ciphers, 
unintelligible to all that have not the key, as fol- 
lows : — 

c 3 



38 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

"31st Dec. 1666. — To my accounts, wherein, at 
last, I find them clear and right ; but to my great 
discontent do find that my gettings this year have 
been 573/. less than my last : it being this year in 
all but 2986/. ; whereas, the last year I got 3560/. 
And then again my spen dings this year have ex- 
ceeded my spendings the last, by 644/. ; my whole 
spendings last year being but 509/. ; whereas this 
year it appears I have spent 1154/., which is a 
sum not fit to be said that ever I should spend in 
one year . . . ." 

" Tut, Samuel Pepys !" says the lady ; " I think 
it a very fitting and grand thing to be said of you. 
It shows our spirit, Pepys, and our taste — But, 
la ! who would have thought when we were i 
the garret in Axe Yard that we should ever have 
been able to do it ! Spell me some more of your 
crooked ciphers — there is a good balance to 
follow." 

The husband reads on — u Yet, blessed be God ! 
and I pray God make me thankful for it, I do find 
myself worth in money, all good, above 6200/. 
which is above 1800/. more than I was worth the 
last year. Thus ends this year of public wonder 
and mischief to this nation." 

" You need not read the reflections that follow 
about the sad condition of the Navy and the dis- 
contents of Parliament and the country and the 
wickedness of the Court : they would only put you 
in your melancholic humour again, Pepys, and I 
know them all by heart. It was only the figures I 
wanted to learn. Six thousand two hundred 
pounds in good coined money, and more gotten 
since, and put in safe keeping! Why, Samuel 
Pepys, this gives me courage to speak again about 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 39 

our setting up a coach. Sweetheart, you were born 
to ride in a coach ! to be your full self you must 
have a coach. All people of honour now-a-clays 
have their coaches. There is no perfect gentility 
without a coach. These hackneys are already be- 
come too common ; they are dirty and dear, and 
are always breaking down, and are otherwise dan- 
gerous. To say nothing of the smallpox and other 
terrible diseases, people have ridden in hackney 
coaches with the plague upon them, and other 
people who have ridden in them afterwards have 
caught the infection, and so died. In your goings 
and comings between this and "Whitehall you oft- 
times ride in those hackneys. Pepys, an you love 
me, set up a coach of your own, and let our live- 
ries be green lined with red. O ! Pepys, how 
grand we shall appear when we drive to a play in 
our own coach !" 

"It is some time since, my love, that I have 
had a mind to buy enough ground to build me a 
coach-house and stable ; for I have had it much in 
my thoughts that it is not too much for me now, in 
degree or cost, to keep a coach, but, contrarily, 
that I am almost ashamed to be seen in a hackney. 
I am almost — nay, I am quite decided. Yes, 
Bessy, so soon as things get a little quieter I will 
assuredly set up my coach. It may be next year, 
but it also may be next month. And, in the mean- 
while, let us be merry and go to the play to-night. 
It is a long while, methinks it is two whole weeks, 
since we were at the play." 

" And what house shall we go to ? to the King's 
>r to the Duke's?" 

" Oh ! to the King's house, my dear one ; for 
Knipp is to do a part in a new play, which she is said 



40 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

to do ravishingly fine. We will go see, and hear 
that merry wench, Knipp, by all means. She was 
once one of our family, you know, your own hand- 
maiden. It was I first taught her to sing and act 
a little, and (God forgive me !) first put the notion 
of stage-playing into her head." 

" Mr. Pepys," says the lady, and a cloud, the 
slightest of all clouds of pique or jealousy passes 
across her broad fair brow, " Mr. Pepys, I hope 
you did not put still worse mischief into that 
wench's head? You think rather too much of 
Knipp — you are always for running to see Knipp, 
Mr. Pepys." 

The husband sees the cloud, and applies himself 
to dissipate it. " Knipp is a merry baggage, and 
clever and pretty withal ; but, my Bessy fair, what 
is she, or what is Nelly Gwynn, or what are all 
the actresses at the theatres, or the ladies at court, 
compared with you ? Has not my Lord Sandwich 
said many a time that in beauty you beat them all ? 
And does not your own Samuel doat upon you as 
much as when he first knew you, and used to look 
upon you until his head grew giddy with love ? 
Knipp might go to the devil for me, but for the 
love and respect she bears to you as her former 
mistress. Let us go to the duke's house to-night, 
if it pleases you better." 

Mrs. Pepys, who well knows that her husband 
is the most uxorious of men, laughs away the rem- 
nant of what could hardly be called a frown, and 
says, No ! no ! they will go see Knipp to-night, 
and that handsome youth Kynaston, that all the 
court ladies are mad after, the very next time he 
acts at the other house. Pepys is visibly delighted, 
and goes the length of proposing that to-morrow 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 41 

(provided all is quiet) they shall make a pleasure 
excursion into the country. There is, however, a 
little difference about the course they shall take. 
Pepys would fain go down the river, to talk over 
some new inventions and contrivances with his 
friend Mr. Evelyn, at Say's Court near Deptford, 
and to Erith, to pay a visit to old Sir John Round- 
tree, for the said Sir John has a pretty and rich 
young ward, whose person and fortune he thinks 
will very well suit the son of one of his friends and 
patrons at court — Pepys being a great match- 
maker. But Mrs. Pepys, who has a coach and 
pair running in her head, together with certain 
other whims and fancies she cannot for her life 
get rid of, is all for borrowing a friend's coach and 
driving to the famous wells at Barnet, the waters 
of which are said to have made mothers for the 
first time of many ladies who had been wives con- 
siderably more than twelve years. 

Mrs. Pepys had not yet made her husband a 
father. If she had brought him six sons and five 
daughters, as Pepys's mother brought her husband 
the tailor in the city, it is possible that the money- 
boxes would not have been quite so full as they 
now were. 

Everybody, according to Mrs. Pepys, goes to 
the wells at Barnet. It is the best frequented and 
most gallant of places. Her husband, who had 
hoped to unite profit with pleasure — for the mak- 
ing of a good match is a common means of securing 
patronage — and who perhaps had another project 
which might be forwarded by his going down the 
river, holds out a little for the water- trip to Erith ; 
but this only makes his wife the more eager for 
the .land-trip to Barnet, and Mrs. Peoys always 



42 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

has her own way in the end. For his ready com- 
pliance in the present instance she vouchsafes him 
a kiss, which the loving Clerk of the Navy returns 
right heartily. The tender smack has scarcely 
ceased to echo in the room ere a mighty rapping 
is heard at the street-door. Pepys opens a window, 
and sees that it is only a messenger from the Navy- 
office. He puts on a face of dignity and severity, 
and is going to reprehend the man for making so 
rude a noise ; but the poor fellow cries out — " The 
devil is broken loose ! Joel Wyke is on his way 
to the office with thousands of sailors and sailors' 
wives ; the fanatics are fighting in Tower-street 
with the King's Majesty's guards, and there is one 
of them going about stark naked with a pan of 
burning coals upon his head, crying out Woe ! 
woe ! and that the world is to end to-morrow or 
the day after ; and a war -ship full of mutinous 
sailors has come past the Isle of Dogs with her 
guns all double-shotted, and now all the people do 
say that Tom of the Woods, who foretold the great 
fire last year, hath just foretold a much greater 
calamity for this." 

Before this time a serving-boy had cautiously 
opened the door to the well-known messenger ; but 
Pepys had been too much excited by the man's 
speech to find words to tell him to enter the house 
and not alarm the neighbours. Now, however, 
he bids him enter and close the door, and tells him 
to wait below in the hall untU he is called for. 
Mrs. Pepys is pale with fright, and her husband 
has a tremulous motion about the knees. But with 
inconceivable speed they close, lock, and padlock 
their strong chests, draw the panel which conceals 
a dark recess where some money is deposited, and 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 43 

put all things straight. Pepys then withdraws the 
heavy curtain, and unlocks the room door, and calls 
up the messenger, who has little more to say ex- 
cept that everybody has run away from the Navy- 
office bat Master Hater and Strong the porter, 
who want to know what they are to do. Pepys 
cannot tell them, nor will the terrified messenger 
go back to the office, lest he should fall into the 
hands of the sailors. The man, however, consents 
to go by another road, to warn the lord mayor, 
and to make all the haste he can to Whitehall, 
where there are some mounted guards which may 
be sent. Pepys then goes and makes his toilette, 
and his ]ady does the same with the assistance of 
mistress Knipp's successor. They have not made 
up their minds what to do, but think it best to be 
prepared for a sortie ; for Joel Wyke and many of 
the sailors know the way to their house as well 
as they know the way to the Navy-office. Pepys 
is putting on his peruke in a negligent manner, 
when a firing of muskets is heard in the streets 
not far off, together with tremendous shouts, and 
fearful shrieks of women and children. Pepys ap- 
proaches the window, but his wife drops down on 
a chair, and turns very very pale. The firing 
ceases, but other sounds come nearer and nearer — 
a rushing and running, and the tread as of many 
thousands of feet are heard all round about : then 
there is a halting and fresh shouting. The w r ords 
more distinctly heard are " Money ! Money !" 
" Souls ! Souls ! " " Bread ! bread !" " Hell ! 
Hell ! " " Cash our tickets ! " " Take heed of the 
day of judgment ! " But these sounds and words 
are blended together in the strangest fashion ; and 
they are scon interrupted by drums and trumpets 



44 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

that seem sounding a charge. The rush is re- 
newed, and after a while, a man naked as he was 
born — save that he hath a clout round his middle 
— turns into Seething-lane. His pan of burning 
coal is gone, but he still keeps shouting or shriek- 
ing " Woe ! Woe ! Look to your souls ! The 
day of judgment is at hand ! " And a great mob 
of fanatics that follow him repeat his words in a 
mighty chorus, while some of them cry " Have a 
care of hell ! the sins of the w r orld are too many ! 
the day of judgment is close at hand ! Tom of the 
Woods hath said it, and Tom is never mistaken ! " 
In the wake of these fanaticals there come running 
a great multitude of sailors and sailors' wives, who 
are still shouting, " Money ! money ! Bread ! bread ! 
We will fire the city but we will have these tickets 
changed ! We come for our own, and the King 
sends his guard to fire upon us ! " 

Pepys sees clearly enough that the sailors and 
the fanatic mob are in full retreat, and that no 
great harm is likely to be done to-day in his part 
of the town. The crowd in fact whirls by ; but 
the housekeepers in the lane keep up part of the 
cry when all have disappeared, screaming from their 
windows and house-tops that Tom of the Woods 
is the truest of prophets, and that if he says a 
judgment is at hand, a judgment will assuredly 
happen ; for last year Tom of the Woods said 
that London would be burned, and London was 
burned. 

As soon as the mob is fairly gone, and troops of 
the trained bands of the city are seen in motion at 
the end of Seething-lane, Pepys says he will go 
to Whitehall to make fresh representations of the 
urgent necessity of providing some money to pay 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 45 

the seamen ; for so long as the sailors are discon- 
tented there must be danger to the whole State, 
and a frequent occasion given to all the levellers 
and fifth-monarchy men and fanatics of all sorts, 
to raise their heads. Mrs. Pepys determines to 
accompany him, and after waiting an hour, and 
giving many careful orders to their servants, they 
sally forth on foot to take the shortest way to the 
court end of town. 

Hard by Charing-Cross Mrs. Pepys calls upon 
and stays with a friend, for, although Whitehall is 
as open to all as anyplace of public entertainment, 
the Clerk of the Acts of the Navy does not con- 
sider it as the fittest place to take his pretty wife 
to. Pepys himself proceeds, and soon goes up to 
the matted gallery in the palace, wherein the cour- 
tiers and statesmen of the day do usually congre- 
gate. But he finds that, as far as business is con- 
cerned, he might as well have stayed at home in 
Seething-lane. 

The Lord High Admiral the Duke of York is 
gone a-pleasuring to Cooper's Hill, with Lady 
Denham and Sir Charles Sedley, and various other 
gay dames and gallants ; the King is away at the 
Castlemaine's, very busy in making up a quarrel 
between her ladyship's nursery-maid and her lady- 
ship's cook. Some of the ministers and privy- 
counsellors are gone one way, some another. 
Pepys, however, finds in the Duke's ante-chamber 
his friend Sir William Coventry, who agrees with 
him that the aspect of the times is very awful. — 
Although it is he that hath advised the King to 
equip no fleet this spring, and that has been most 
active at the council-board in carrying this deci- 



46 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

sion. — Coventry is a wise man — a very wise man 
— a Solomon, quite a Solomon at court ; but, as 
he knows that the court has no money to pay the 
sailors, he says he will advise the King to take 
measures of severity against the fanatics in the 
city, and to get hold of Tom of the Woods, whose 
prophecies he takes to be the main cause of the 
scandalous behaviour of the seamen. Pepys thinks 
this is beginning at the wrong end, but is far too 
prudent to say so ; and, giving the right honour- 
able member of the Privy Council some informa- 
tion respecting the evil seer, and the woods in 
Kent which Tom hath been wont to frequent, he 
bows and takes his leave. At his wife's friend's by 
Charing-Cross he finds a good dinner, and then 
certain intelligence that the city is perfectly quiet, 
and that the train-bands have done wondrous 
things. Therefore, he and Mrs. Pepys go to the 
King's house after all. Knipp excels, and does 
her part very extraordinarily well. Pepys is in 
ecstasies, more especially when Knipp sings his 
own song i Beauty Retire.' He and Mrs. Pepys 
are marvellously curious to know who a certain 
lady is that never takes off her black mask, and 
that hath a beautiful white hand. They stay till 
the end of the play, then seek a hackney, and so 
home at about twelve o'clock at night. Their 
servants tell them that a good number of the fana- 
tics and riotous sailors have been seized, and made 
fast in prison. They thank God therefore, and 
eat a little supper, and so to bed. Mrs. Pepys 
dreams of her coach and pair of Flanders mares, 
and of the Wells at Barnet. Pier husband has his 
pleasant visions too, but they are mixed with ugly 



THE CLERK OF THE NAVY AT HOME. 47 

sights and sounds, such as sailors' tickets and Joel 
Wyke's harangues, naked fanatics with burning 
coals on their pates, and sailors crying " Pay, pay! 
Money, money ! " Oh ! Clerk of the Acts of the 
Navy, you will have uglier dreams yet before this 
wonderful and, to England, disgraceful year, six- 
teen hundred and sixty-seven, be past and gone. 






( 48 ) 



CHAPTER III. 

A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 

The merry King and his court eagerly embraced 
the opinion that, as the French King had testified 
a willingness to negotiate, and to separate his in- 
terests from those of the Republican De Witt and 
the Seven United Provinces, there was nothing to 
fear from the Dutch ; and that as for the mutinies 
and riots of the sailors, they were entirely owing, 
not to want and hunger, but to the fanatics that 
lurked in the city, and to the disaffected prophecy- 
ings of Tom of the Woods, a strange old man, who 
had been leading an eremitical life in the woods 
between Woolwich and Erith. It was therefore 
resolved in a hurried council, which was held 
between night and morning, in the matted gallery 
at Whitehall, that the Lord Mayor and the train- 
bands should be thanked for what they had done in 
putting down the rioters ; that a new proclamation 
should be hurled, some day soon, at the heads of 
the fanatics ; and that some confidential servant of 
the court should be sent to procure the arrest of 
Tom of the Woods with as little noise as possible. 
The morning after the visit of the Clerk of the 
Acts of the Navy, a finely dressed gallant, followed 
by a serving-man almost as fine as himself, issued 
from Whitehall, and swaggered towards Charing- 
Cross Stairs, a usual place of embarkation for the 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 49 

court end of town. It was rather an early hour 
for a courtly spark to be up and abroad ; but his 
flushed cheek and reddened eyes, and a certain un- 
steadiness in his gait, seemed to indicate that this 
cavaliero had not been in bed. He was a tall, 
well-proportioned man, and otherwise well-favoured 
by nature ; but dissipation and other evil* habits 
had spoiled his countenance, and there was no 
looking in his face without seeing rake and bully 
written upon it in most legible characters. He 
was not young ; but his grey hairs were concealed 
by a Louis Quatorze periwig, and his clothes, gay 
in colour, and of the newest fashion, helped to give 
an air of juvenility. He turned into the first 
tavern he found open, just to settle his head and 
nerves, or to take a hair of the tail of the dog 
which had bitten him overnight. The Lambeth 
ale was so cool and good, that he took a second 
cup of it ; and as the hostess had a passable face, 
and a very roguish laughing eye, he stayed gossip- 
ing for nearly an hour. He and his man then 
resumed their walk to the stairs, where a score or 
two of watermen saluted them with cries of " East- 
ward, ho ! Boat, your honours." " Monsieur Fait- 
tout," said the almost hiccuping cavalier to his 
attendant, " we must have a boat of the largest, 
and two pair of oars, for I have no fancy to spoil 
my best cloak in shooting the bridge, and it is 
sometimes rough water below Greenwich. See to 
it, Faittout ; and tell these rascaille people not to 
make such a noise. It is time they should learn 
better manners when they see a gentleman of the 
court." 

Now Faittout, who came from the banks of the 
Seine, could scarcely speak intelligible English, 



50 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

and many mistakes were committed, and there was 
a great deal of laughter among our jolly Thames 
watermen before a bargain could be concluded, or 
even before it could be understood by the boat- 
men that his honour wanted a good boat to carry 
him a§ far as Erith. At length the necessary 
arrangements were made, and the cavalier and his 
Frenchman stepped into a trim launch, well manned 
with four stout rowers, and the master-waterman 
to steer. As they shot away from the stairs a 
shrewd-looking old boatman said, — "I wonder 
whether that fine spark hath money enough about 
him to pay the fare. If I had been Jerry I would 
have made him pay beforehand, for 't is a serious 
pull from here to Erith. As for casts across to the 
playhouse at Bankside, they are, singly, but small 
matters — and yet for those casts I wot not how 
much is owing to me by these court-gallants, who 
never have any money about them, and are always 
promising to pay next time." 

" Ah ! Ben," said another of the boatmen, " these 
Charing-Cross Stairs be about the most pestilent 
beggarly stairs, for sculls or oars, that be anywhere 
upon the river ! They be so swarmed by your 
penniless court-gallants. Merry waterman as I 
am, I could^ almost find it in my heart to wish 
that the by-gone times were not by-gone ; for, if 
the Roundheads did set their sour faces against 
sports, and shut up the playhouses and the bear- 
gardens at Bankside,^fas everywhere else, they 
always paid their fares, and never thought of draw- 
ing swords upon a man as these cavalieros do at 
the slightest offence taken." j 

By this time the boat was well out in the bed of 
the river, and going at good speed. It was just at 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 51 

the turn of tide, and the four men pulled vigor- 
ously and gaily, hoping to reach their destination 
before low- water. But when they came abreast of 
the Temple Stairs, the cavalier sings — 

l " Nous ne pouvons rien trouver sur la terre 
Qui soit si bon, ni si beau que la verre," 

and must needs land and take a morning-draught 
with a friend, who is known to have some strange 
and incomparably good claret. This occupied 
good part of an hour. When our gentleman 
embarked again, he was fresh and boisterously 
merry — so much so that he had some smart thing 
to say to every boat they met or crossed, and when 
no boat was near he either sang bits of songs or 
talked and laughed with his attendant. Some of 
his songs were English, but more were French : 
his talk with Monsieur Faittout was wholly in 
French, which considerably annoyed the boatmen. 
Notwithstanding the paralysed state of trade there 
were a good many boats upon the river, and several 
eminent merchants were seen taking this pleasant 
highway from their houses in the country to the 
city. Our cavalier made some envious remark 
about the wealth of these city traders ; but he con- 
soled himself with the thought that all trade was 
but a trick, and quoted his friend Sir John Den- 
ham, pointing at the citizens' boats as he said,— ; 

[ " There, with like haste, through several ways, they run, 
Some to undo, and some to be undone." 

When they came near to the stairs at the city 
side of London Bridge, the cavalier must needs 
stop again ; for a gaily dressed lady had just landed 
from a boat, and was displaying a pair of unusually 



52 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

fine legs as she ascended the rough wooden steps. 
The old master of the boat, who was steering, 
hoped and begged that his honour would not tarry- 
long, as the tide was running so finely down now, 
and as it would be hard toil to make Erith if they 
did not make it before the return-tide. The cava- 
liero said he would be back to the boat in no time. 
As master and man ran up the steps, the master 
singing — 

" When ladies call, I '11 have at all ; 
My father did so before me," 

old Jerry scratched his head, and wished he had 
never entered into competition for such a fare. 
One quarter of an hour passed, and then another — 
and there was no mistaking the progress of time in 
that latitude, so abounding in church clocks and 
chimes ; but when the third quarter struck, old 
Jerry lost the little patience that was left to him, 
and the men wished the courtier to all manner of 
unmentionable places. The master of the boat 
was near upon deciding that the best thing to do 
would be to put up with the loss of his fare so far, 
and think no more of the courtier, when his Honour 
hove in sight with a green parrot in a cage in his 
hand, and with his valet close behind him, carrying 
a monkey. A crowd of dirty little boys followed 
the waiting-man, being attracted and amused by 
the monkey, who did not like his present mode of 
conveyance, but grinned and bit at poor Faittout, 
who made almost as many grimaces as Jacko him- 
self. As old Jerry handed the cavalier over the 
gunwale he said, in no very pleasant tone — " Your 
honour has made us lose the best of thetide : we 
shall have it right against us before we get toErith." 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 53 

M Xever mind, base Bezonian," said the cavalier ; 
w your men will row all the harder, and we will 
hoist a sail when below Deptford." 

The boat again was put in motion, the bridge — 
then London's only bridge — was cleared without 
disaster, and the cavalier again began to talk 
volubly with his attendant. 

" Faittout," said he in his French, " though the 
baggage was fro ward, and not worth the running 
after, it was well she met my eye, for otherwise I 
should never have thought of these presents, which 
will be very acceptable in the house to which we 
are going. I think I once promised the young- 
mistress a talking-bird, as she talks so little her- 
self, and the old dame has a great penchant and 
partiality for apes." 

" Parbleu ! " said Faittout ; " then I wish she 
had got this mischievous beast in charge, for he 
has bitten my hands in three places already." 

" Hold him not so tight, Faittout. Give him 
his chain ; he is too prudent a beast to quit the 
boat by leaping overboard." 

The waiting-man, happy to be released, let the 
monkey go. 

The cavalier continued his discourse upon the 
singular good fortune of being attracted to shore, 
and led to a place where there was so good a choice 
of monkeys and outlandish birds. As he was 
talking in this strain, the parrot in the cage began 
to talk also, and to swear and scream, in the fashion 
of parrots who have had a long education on board 
ship, at the monkey, who, after biting the calf of 
old Jerry's legyand getting a good kick in return, 
had set himself down in front of the cage, to tor- 
ment poor Poll. Before they got from the rapids 



54 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

of London Bridge to the shallows of the Isle of 
Dogs, old Jerry and his men were about equally 
sick of all their four passengers, and heartily wished 
they had them all on shore. For the monkey and 
the parrot we cannot speak, but as they were off 
Greenwich the courtier and the waiting-man as- 
suredly wished themselves on shore. For a boat- 
ful of mutinous or discontented sailors came up 
with them, and, after much violent language, 
threatened to throw them overboard as a pair of 
the court thieves, that robbed the King, and caused 
the poor seamen of his Majesty's navy to be left to 
starve. Inattentive as he was, and more than half 
besotted, the cavalier could not but observe that 
these forward boisterous men were cheered and 
encouraged by other sailors and boatmen, and that 
there was a great deal of confusion on every part 
of the river below bridge, and not the least sign of 
any guard or police to preserve order. The inso- 
lent boat, however, made land at one of the Green- 
wich stairs, without attempting any actual mischief. 
"When he was a good half mile from them, the 
cavalier talked big of what he would have done if 
they had assaulted him, and called them candidates 
for Tyburn. Old Jerry ventured to say that many 
poor sailors w r ere driven desperate by want, and 
that mischief must come of it : that he was sure 
the King's Majesty knew not how much these men 
and their wives and children were suffering, or 
surely he would find money to relieve them. And, 
generally, at this time, and even at a later period, 
the people of England were disposed to give 
Charles credit for having a kind heart and good 
intentions, and to throw the entire blame of the 
national distress, and the gross and palpable mis- 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 55 

management of the State, upon his ministers and 
courtiers. Faittout said that if such an insult as 
had been offered to his master had been offered in 
France to a French courtier, King Louis would 
have hanged up every one of the sailors. He also 
said that the English people knew not what starva- 
tion meant, and that if they wanted to learn what 
starving really was, they ought to go see the poor 
in his country. The gentle knight said that the 
English people had become over-free and insolent 
since the beginning of the great Rebellion, but 
that he hoped the King would soon be enabled to 
restore the Marshalsea Court and the Star- Cham- 
ber, and so bring them back to reason, and a 
proper reverence to their superiors. The gallows 
and the pillory were the best instructors of the 
rabble, not but that scourging at the cart's-tail, 
and cutting off men's ears, made very salutary im- 
pressions on the popular mind ; and he thought 
that a score or two of gibbets erected along the 
river would purge the land of its present evil 
humours and discontents. He said this in French, 
and having said it, he ceased to think at all about 
it, and began to sing a French love-song : and 
when he had finished his French love-song he sang 
a verse of an English drinking-song, written by 
Alexander Brome, one of the Anacreons of the 
cavalier party : 

'•' Come, come, let us drink, 
'T is in vain to think, 
Like fools, on grief and sadness ; 
Let our money fly, 
And our sorrows die, 
All worldly care is madness : 
But sack and good cheer 
Will, in spite of our fear 
Inspire our souls with gladness/' 

D 2 



56 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

They were now getting below Deptford, but 
there was little or no wind, and the very little that 
blew was not favourable. No sail could be hoisted, 
but the boatmen worked all the harder, in order to 
save the tide, only hoping that his honour would 
remember their toils in the drink-penny. Although 
it was a beautiful day, both man and master grew 
very fidgety and sick of the boat. Neither of them 
could find recreation in watching the floating sum- 
mer clouds, or the flow of the majestic river, or in 
catching the notes of the birds which played among 
the rushes close by the water-side, or which sang 
merrily out from the woods and thickets on the 
slopes of the Kentish hills. No ships, and scarcely 
any boats, were in motion in this part of the Thames 
— for trade was stopped, and had been for weeks. 
The cavalier pathetically lamented the toils and 
discomforts that must be undergone by those who 
faithfully serve princes. He then played a little 
with the monkey, and discoursed a little with the 
parrot ; and, as the next and very best thing he 
could do, he stretched himself at his full length, 
and went fast asleep, in the hope of not waking 
until they came to Erith. But Faittout fell asleep 
also, and the monkey, to the great diversion of the 
watermen, began to play with the cavalier's peri- 
wig ; and this waked him, and brought down a 
volley of French oaths upon the head of the 
French valet for not having prevented it. Jacko 
was made fast to one of the boat-seats, and master 
and man returned to their slumber. But it was 
now the parrot's turn to murder sleep, and she set 
up such a screaming and screeching, that the cava- 
lier sprung to his feet, and nearly fell overboard. 
" Faittout," said he, "I took that for the voice of 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 57 

the vintner's wife at the Heaven tavern. It was 
just so she screamed the other night, when Tom 
Talbot and I drew upon the varlet her husband 
for not bringing us more canary." 

The valet, only half awake, muttered — " Qui, 
Monseigneur, la voix de Madame est terrible" 
Meaning to say, that the voice of the vintner's 
wife at the Heaven tavern was very dreadful. 

Old Jerry hung a tarpaulin over the bird-cage, 
which simple operation put a stopper upon the 
bird's tongue, and allowed the passengers to get a 
good long nap. If the courtier, or hanger-on of 
the court, awoke somewhat soberer than he was 
before he fell asleep, he also awoke in a more 
irritable humour. The men also were irritable 
and very weary, and said that they must stop and 
rest and refresh themselves for a few minutes at a 
little house of entertainment close by the water- 
side, under the village and church of Charlton. 
Upon mention of this not unreasonable intention, 
the cavalier flew out in a passion, calling the poor 
boatmen rascal-people, buffle-heads, sluggards, and 
beer-swillers, and telling them that he must not be 
stayed, as he was going upon the King's business — 
upon state business of the utmost importance. 

" I wish," said one of the watermen, " that your 
worship's honour had thought of this when you 
stayed so long at the Temple, and when you ran 
after that pair of clean linen stockings at the bridge 
stairs ! " 

Upon this the cavalier flew into a still higher 
passion, and called the man many hard names. 
Now the London watermen, being at all times a 
bold and free set of fellows, would not stomach 
this language, or be induced by it to forego the 



58 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

little rest and the cup of drink they had proposed 
to themselves ; and so they pulled in to shore, made 
the boat fast, and went up to the alehouse, leaving 
the courtier, the valet, the parrot, and the monkey 
to themselves. The poor fellows, however, scarcely 
stopped one quarter of an hour. By the time they 
got halfway down Halfway Reach the tide was 
out ; and very soon it began to make against them. 
This increase of toil did not add to their good 
humour, and the slowness of the boat's progress 
increased the irritation of the very impatient and 
now very hungry cavalier. At last, however, they 
pulled round the point into Erith Reach, caught 
sight of the taper spire and ivy-covered walls of 
the village church, and made Erith ; but they were 
all in a very ill-humour, which was soon made 
worse by sundry little circumstances. As the tide 
had only j ust begun to rise, there was a long strip 
of mud between the water's edge and the little 
wooden pier or wharf of the village, and this must 
be crossed, and can hardly be crossed without mis- 
chief to fine garments. Old Jerry the master, 
having an eye to his fare, proposed that two of the 
men should doff the nethermost parts of their attire 
and carry the passengers on their shoulders. The 
men, despairing of the drink-penny, and smarting 
with the ill-treatment they had received, at first 
refused to do anything of the kind, one of them 
saying, with particular emphasis, that it should 
never be said an Englishman had made himself a 
beast to be ridden upon by a French varlet. There 
was nobody on the wharf save two or three little 
boys and a couple of old women, who were very 
busy in packing shrimps, or in eating them. Old 
Jerry, knowing the dogged obstinacy of his lads, 






A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 59 

hailed the two old women ; but both master and 
man flew out against such a mode of conveyance, 
the cavalier swearing that it would be a stain upon 
his knighthood, and Faittout protesting that his 
respect and tendresse for the fair sex would not 
allow him to use ladies in that way. 

But the thought uppermost in both their minds 
was that the old women might stumble with them, 
and so spoil their finery ; this thought being per- 
haps mingled with an unpleasant idea of the laugh- 
able figures they would cut being so mounted. 

At last the cavalier had recourse to smooth 
words and promises : over and above the fare 
agreed upon he would give the boat's crew a good 
silver crown. Being thus mollified, though not 
yet restored to their habitual good-humour, two 
sturdy fellows partially stripped themselves and 
got into the water. The knight, taking the cage 
with the parrot in it in his hand, mounts first by 
throwing his two legs over the boatman's shoulders, 
and holding on by the fellow's rough poll. Poll 
being restored to daylight by the removing of the 
tarpaulin, renews her hooting and screaming. 
Faittout vows he cannot manage the monkey, but 
his bearer says it will be a queer thing if a London 
waterman can't carry a Frenchman and a monkey 
both together ; and catching at the chain and 
coiling it round his wrist, he brings Jacko tight 
under his left arm, telling him to be w r ell behaved. 
Then Faittout mounts, and away they go. 

The cavalier and the parrot got safely to the 
little wharf and to terra firma, but it fared other- 
wise with the valet and monkey. Just as they 
were in the deepest part of the mud, Jacko, though 
firmly and skilfully held, contrived to give the 



60 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

boatman a fearful bite in the fleshiest part of his 
arm. The fellow swore a loud oath, importing that 
the filthy ape had made his teeth meet in his flesh ; 
and then he gave a lurch to leeward, and as Fait- 
tout did not sit steady, the centre of gravity was 
lost, and boatman, Frenchman, and monkey lay 
sprawling in the mud and slush. How the boat- 
men laughed, and how the old women and little 
boys laughed and screamed, need not be told. Old 
Jerry, whom age had made prudent and circum- 
spect, told his two fellows in the boat that they 
were putting their silver crown in jeopardy ; but 
if possession of the king's crown in the Tower had 
depended upon it, the lads could not have stopped 
their laughter. It took them some time to disentangle 
themselves from one another and clear the sludge 
from their eyes ; but eventually the three who had 
been sprawling in the mud, got singly and severally 
to the wharf, the monkey dragging his chain after 
him and looking very disconsolate, and the valet 
raving and swearing in French, and being on the 
utmost verge of rage and mortification, and so 
soiled that there was no telling of what stuff or 
what colours his dress was made — that dress which 
but a few minutes before had been so bright and 
gay — that dress which had not yet been paid for, 
and which was not likely to be soon replaced by a 
new suit, as there was hardly left in the wide range 
of London a single tailor so credulous or desperate 
as to trust a man like the cavalier any longer. 
The boatman, who was still smarting with the 
monkey's bite, was at first disposed to be very 
wroth ; but when he looked at Faittout he could 
not help joining in the laugh which still continued, 
and which in fact never stopped until the water- 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 61 

man who had carried the cavalier held out his hand 
with the palm open, and with a bow and a scrape 
asked his honour for the fare. The cavalier swore 
with a terrible oath that his comrade had purposely 
thrown his valet and monkey into the mud, that 
they were all of them a traitorous set, and that he 
would give them no crown and no drinking-money 
whatever. He put his hands into his deep pocket 
to draw out the stipulated fare and not a doit more ; 
but after fumbling for a good minute, all the money 
he could find did not amount to half the fare. He 
asked his valet whether he had not a few pieces of 
silver about him. Faittout said that his pockets 
were empty — that he had emptied them at the bird 
and beast shop to make up the price of the monkey. 
For a moment the cavalier seemed rather discon- 
certed ; but putting on his most courteous face — 
which was not done without a great effort — he put 
all the money he had into the boatman's hand, and 
told him he would pay the remainder the day next 
after to-morrow, when he would be returned to 
London. The fellow set up a whoop and holla, 
and called to old Jerry in the boat, that the spark 
was for being off without paying his fare. At 
these sounds the last laugh in the boat was cut 
short ; and without caring for their clothes and 
comfort, old Jerry and the two lads leaped into 
the water, ran across the mud, and joined their two 
comrades on the wharf. As they carried oars and 
a sharp boathook with them, they were not to be 
scared by the cavalier, who had drawn his long 
rapier, but who found himself obliged to come to 
a parley. 

" By a slight inadvertence," said the knightly 
personage, " I came from the court without my 

d 3 



62 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

purse, and Laving made some purchases on the 
way " 

" That screech-owl of a bird and that biting 
monkey," said the man that had been bitten. % 

" I have not wherewith to satisfy your immode- 
rate demands ; but come to me the day next after 
to-morrow to Whitehall, and you shall be paid in 
full ; but drink-money ye will have none, for ye 
have all behaved scandalously." 

" I will to none of your Whitehalls," said old 
Jerry ; " I know well what that land is, and what 
an honest man gets by going to it. I should get 
cuffed and maltreated, and then clapped up in the 
gatehouse like silver-oar Sam, who is still in prison 
for going into the purlieus of the court to ask his 
own." 

" Then," quoth the knight, " will I send down 
to you at Charing-Cross Stairs this my gentleman, 
whom ye will all know." 

u We shall never forget him," said one of the 
boatmen, eyeing Faittout, and putting his tongue 
out at one corner of his mouth ; " but the chances 
are we shall never see him come to our stairs again, 
or never with the money in his hand." 

The cavalier was going to storm at this distrust 
of a gentleman's word ; but his bullying propensi- 
ties were checked by seeing that several aquatic 
or amphibious-looking men had gathered in his 
rear. They were sailors and fishermen, who had 
come down from the village, and who showed a 
marked bias in favour of the boatmen. " 'T is 
shameful and monstrous," said one of them, " that 
poor sailors should be cheated and starved, and 
that these high-flying sparks should have no bowels 
for our honest watermen." 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 63 

u We are robbed and cheated by some of them 
every day," said one of old Jerry's men ; " there is 
no honesty left above bridge ! But we did not 
come all this way in our best launch to be mal- 
treated, and robbed besides of our dues." 

" Take off his gold-laced cloak, and keep it for 
your fare," said one of the Erith fishermen. 

" And let us drag him through the mud,'' said 
a very strange-looking Erith waterman, who wore 
a red coat, and had a very strange voice — a voice 
which was sometimes a squeak, and sometimes a 
growl — " I say," added this red-coated man, be- 
ginning with his squeak and ending witli his growl, 
"Let us give his honour a mud-bath, like his ape 
and that other outlandish monkey. " 

" Do," said Knapp the baker, another of the 
droll- visaged worthies of Erith, who had just ar- 
rived. 

These two last propositions quite unmanned the 
cavalier. He offered to leave both parrot and 
monkey in pledge for payment, but Jerry and his 
men would none of them, having had too much of 
them already ; and they vowed they would have 
their money ere they left the courtier. In these 
straits the cavalier, who had made some awkward 
appearances before-time, and who wished to avoid 
making his first salutation to his kinsman this time 
by borrowing money from him, found himself un- 
der the absolute necessity of naming Sir John 
Roundtree, and requesting that old Jerry or one 
of his lads would follow him up the hill to Sir 
John's house, where the money would surely be 
paid. The name of Sir John stilled the tempest 
in a moment : the Erith folk all saying that Sir 
John was a man of worship, and justice of the 



64 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

peace, a most worthy man, and honest in all his 
dealings, and an especial good friend and employer 
of the poor ; and Knapp the baker vowing that 
there was not so good a knight anywhere between 
Erith and Gravesend on the one side, or between 
London and Erith on the other. Upon these sa- 
tisfactory explanations touching the character of 
Sir John Roundtree, old Jerry agreed to go up to 
the house for the money. As, however, the dis- 
tance from the river to the house was more than 
half a mile, and as Jerry knew not but that the 
cavalier and his man might play him a trick by 
the road, he called upon two of his smart lads to 
follow him. Two or three of the Erith sailors 
said they would go too ; for they had nothing to 
do just now, and had very good hopes of getting a 
glass of good ale if they went up to Sir John's — 
it being a very ancient maxim in that honourable 
family that it was very unlucky to send any man 
away from the gate without giving him to drink. 
Neminem tristem demisit — the Roundtrees never 
allowed any man to depart with an empty belly. 
When these preliminaries had been settled, and 
when Monsieur Faittout had somewhat freed him- 
self from the mud which covered him from head 
to foot, the march up the hill began — and a curi- 
ous march it was. Old Jerry, with a boathook 
in his hand, marched first ; then went Faittout, 
who was still very slimy, leading that pestilent 
monkey by the chain ; next went the cavalier with 
the cage and parrot, and then Jerry's two smart 
lads (each with an oar in his hand), and the Erith 
fishermen and sailors. The two old women stayed 
where they were with the shrimps ; but the dirty 
little boys followed the procession, and as they 



A VOYAGE TO ERITH. 65 

went from the wharf through the straggling vil- 
lage half a score other ragged little urchins ran 
out to see the monkey, and to follow it up the hill, 
clapping their hands, and shouting at its caprices 
and gambols, which continued to be the cause of 
great distress to the serving-man, for the sad ape 
would not go straight forward, but kept jumping 
from one side of the road to the other, or running 
round and round, and entangling Faittout's legs 
with his chain. In this manner the company, 
though still further increased by some bumpkins 
who came across fields and hedges to look on open- 
mouthed, arrived in front of Sir John Roundtree's 
mansion. That worthy knight, who was sitting at 
an open window with my Lady his wife, cried out, 
as he caught sight of the cavalier, " Why, as I 
live, here 's my mad cousin Sir Ralph Spicer ! But 
what a strange attendance he hath ! What, in the 
devil's name, hath he been about now ? S 'life, he 
hath got a foreign talking-bird in his hand, and 
that outlandish varlet of his, that seemeth in a 
queer pickle, is dancing with a baboon." 

Although Sir John laughed, and marvelled 
much, he was not altogether pleased with this 
visit, his cousin Sir Ralph's visits having cost him 
rather dear before now. But Sir John was a tho- 
rough-bred cavalier (of the good sort) ; he believed 
that any man who stood in the near relation of a 
full cousin had a claim upon his purse, and he 
looked upon hospitality as the most sacred of du- 
ties. He was soon in the hall, and at the door, 
welcoming his kinsman. After hugging and em- 
bracing him in the Whitehall or French fashion, 
Sir Ralph took his cousin aside, explained his case, 
and borrowed the little money he immediately 



66 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

wanted, intending to get rather a larger sum out 
of that purse before he again quitted Kent. Old 
Round tree reprehended Jerry for failing in respect 
and reverence to a man of quality, but he then 
gave the crown for drinking-money which Sir 
Ralph refused to do, and, telling the company all 
to go round to the butler at the back of the house, 
and get a cup of ale a-piece, he dismissed them, and 
conducted his cousin into the mansion. 

Faittout was sent to wash and clean the monkey, 
and make him fit to be presented to Lady Round- 
tree, and to dry himself, and clean himself, and 
smarten himself as best he could ; and his master, 
having borrowed a clean ruff and laced bands from 
his cousin (for Sir Ralph had encumbered himself 
with no luggage, and had brought nothing with 
him except the clothes on his back, and the ape 
and parrot), withdrew to an airy and most clean 
and comfortable bed-chamber to trim himself. 
While thus engaged Sir Ralph forgot all his vex- 
ations. " Well," said he to himself, " here I am, 
after all, safe in Kent, and well lodged, and with 
the prospect of good diet. Yes, ]ast night I was 
at the Devil tavern, drinking with Tom Killi- 
grew — this morning I was at Whitehall — and now 
here am I at Erith. So wags the world. But 
your true cavaliers are at home wherever they go. 
What says old Jack Denham ? — 

1 At Paris, at Rome, 
At the Hague, they 're at home ; 
The good fellow is nowhere a stranger/ 

So now for that credulous old dame my Lady 
Roundtree, and that shy damsel mistress Marion : 
of one or the other, or of both, something may be 
made." 



( 67 ) 



CHAPTER IV. 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 



Immense were the changes or transfers of pro- 
perty occasioned by the great civil war, and 
mournful was the fate of many of the honestest 
partisans of Charles I. Of late years the manor 
of Erith had repeatedly changed hands. Sir Wil- 
liam Compton, the last noble owner, " being a 
most loyal and valiant gentleman/'' according to 
the King's party, and " an incurable malignant,"* 
according to the Commonwealth party, had en- 
gaged on the royal side when only in the eighteenth 
year of his age, and he had been governor of Ban- 
bury Castle, and had fought in many battles and 
sieges for King Charles ; but he had found him- 
self under the necessity of selling the manor of 
Erith, since the Restoration, to a Mr. -Ludwig, a 
trader of London, who had quickly resold it to 
one Nicholas Vannacker, a city merchant of Dutch 
extraction, who had shut up the old manor-house, 
which stood at the entrance of the village, coming 
from Cray ford, and which had been the seat of 
hospitality in the time of the ancient Comptons. 
Except his house and grounds, Sir John Roundtree 
— descended from a family which had held consi- 
derable estates here as far back as the days of the 
Plantagenets — had not much land within the pa- 
rish, his chief estate lying at a short distance. 



68 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

A pleasant and spacious old house, and right 
pleasantly situated, Mas that of our worthy old 
Kentish knight. It had been built, in the early 
part of the reign of Elizabeth, by his great-grand- 
father. It had fine bay-windows, and some mas- 
sive and most picturesque stacks of chimneys, 
which towered above the gable-ends of the roof. 
It stood on a green, swelling knoll. In front 
flowed the broad, majestic Thames : behind were 
finely wooded hills and parks. There was a garden 
near the house, laid out according to the plan of 
the great Lord Bacon. Everything in and about 
the place was upon some old plan, and strictly in 
accordance with the building : there was nothing 
modish, or new-fashioned, — nothing betokening 
transition or change, — but all things were solid, 
sober, and antiquated, and proper to carry the 
mind back to a former age. The character of Sir 
John Round tree harmonized with the place, and 
may have been influenced by it. He was a hale 
man, and born considerably within the seventeenth 
century ; but his manners and thoughts were all 
of the preceding century, and he might have been 
taken for an honest country knight of the time of 
the Maiden Queen. Like Dryden's Kentish squire, 
he was stout, and plain in speech and in behaviour ; 
loved none of the fine town tricks of breeding, but 
stood up for the old Elizabeth-way in all things. 
He was a royalist and a high-churchman, as his 
father and grandfather had been before him ; and 
he never could conceive how a Roundtree, or any 
true-bred, honest English gentleman, could be any- 
thing else. What had contributed not a little to 
the steadiness of his principles was the fact that he 
had all through life shut his ears and eyes to any- 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 69 

thing that made against them. It was long, very- 
long ere he could believe that the Cavaliers could 
ever be in the wrong, or the Roundheads ever in 
the right. Yet in the hour of success and pros- 
perity his zeal was tempered by a kindly heart and 
a rough magnanimity ; and whether in good or 
evil fortune, whether triumphant with his party or 
cast down with it, no man could well be more dis- 
interested and single-minded. It is true the kingly 
office was in his eye a holy thing, but his passion-' 
ate love for the King and the Church was coupled 
with the inward and never-doubting belief that 
there was no happiness for the people of England 
without them ; and he never looked to the obtain- 
ing of any personal advantage from them, or by 
them. In fact, contented and happy at home, he 
had rarely been to the great city, though living so ' 
near to it, and he had never once shown himself 
at court until Charles I. was a fugitive from Lon- 
don, and a part of his subjects were in arms against 
him. Then Sir John put on the iron jacket which 
his grandfather had worn in 1588, when Queen 
Elizabeth was menaced by the Spanish Armada, 
and hastened away to join the King at Oxford, to 
offer him his money and his services, and the ser- 
vices of his only son, a handsome youth, and the 
joy and pride of his heart, who very soon perished 
in battle. The death of her son, and her anxieties 
for her absent husband, brought his first wife to the 
grave ; his estate was seized by the Parliament, 
and he was reduced oftentimes to feel the want of 
that crust of bread and cup of ale which he had 
never had the heart to refuse to any man. But 
not for this did he murmur or turn his back on a 
losing and desperate cause : he fought gallantly all 



70 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

through the long, unhappy war, and never came 
in or submitted until the cause was utterly lost, 
and the King brought to the block. Until Crom- 
well secured possession of a more than kingly 
power, Sir John was left in a very reduced and 
precarious state, being repeatedly thrown into pri- 
son as a malcontent and rebel to Parliament. But 
when the great-minded usurper put a drag to the 
wheels of revolution, and began to re-organize the 
state, Sir John was allowed to compound for his 
estate, and the terms of his composition were made 
comparatively light, through the mediation of an 
old neighbour, who had taken the opposite side in 
politics, and who stood high in the favour of the 
Protector. But for Captain Hemingford the pa- 
ternal acres at Erith and Bexley might have been 
sadly clipped by the commissioners. Yet, at the 
time he rendered this essential service to his old 
playmate and once dear friend, Sir John Round- 
tree had not seen him for a long while, and would 
scarcely have spoken to him if they had chanced 
to meet. Before the disputes between King and 
Parliament came to a head they had had many dis- 
putes — if we can give the name of disputation to 
the warm conversation of two men, both equally 
determined to adhere to their own previously 
formed opinions, and each determined not to listen 
to the other. But after recovering possession of 
his estate upon such easy terms of composition, and 
after knowing — not from Hemingford, who did all 
he could to conceal the service he had rendered to 
his proud old neighbour, but from Cromwell's 
commissioners and from other sources — that he 
was indebted to the captain, he again sought him 
out, and gave him, if not his entire friendship, a 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 71 

great deal of gratitude and some of his old kindli- 
ness. " Dick Hemingford," Sir John would say, 
" has been corrupted by the times and evil asso- 
ciates, and has been turned into a Roundhead ; but 
he was born a gentleman, and he cannot help it." 
Of his own ancient lineage Sir John was very 
proud. Few sights were more grateful in his eyes 
than that of the dark old grave-stone at the en- 
trance into the south aisle of Erith church, with 
the brass plate upon it, bearing this inscription in 
Gothic and scarcely legible characters — 

" Ellin atte Coke gist icy 
dleu de sa alme mercy." 

Some of the lands he held came to him through 
this Ellin atte Coke, wife to Peter atte Coke, 
otherwise -called Peter de Wellinsburg, who was 
enfeoffed of lands at Erith in the time of King 
Edward III. " I should like to know/' Sir John 
had often been heard to say, " whether this Van- 
nacker — this Dutch lord of a Kentish manor — had 
a grandmother that wanted God's mercy in the 
fourteenth century." During the Protectorate — 
when Hemingford's party was everything, and 
Roundtree's nothing — they at times renewed their 
disputations, the captain endeavouring to convert 
the knight, and the knight endeavouring, just as 
earnestly, and quite as fearlessly, to convert the 
Commonwealth captain. Hemingford would at 
times express his astonishment at Sir John's obsti- 
nacy in not allowing a single political virtue to 
Mr. Hampden ; and Sir John, being the hotter 
tempered man of the two, would occasionally lose 
all patience with Hemingford for his denying the 
high qualities of Lord Falkland. They lived near 



72 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

to each other, the house of Hemingford being 
barely a mile from Roundtree's mansion. They 
interchanged visits, but perhaps (albeit they agreed 
after a time to exclude politics and polemics from 
their conversation) it was fortunate for their re- 
stored or reviving friendship that the captain was 
a good deal at sea. 

When Oliver died, when Richard Cromwell 
quietly withdrew, and when Charles II. was re- 
called by General Monk, and hailed on his return, 
by the great majority of the English people, with 
transports of joy, Hemingford — who had bravely 
fought for the Commonwealth, or for his country, 
under the great Blake — retired from the service, 
and was thought by some men (though assuredly 
not by himself) to stand in need of a friend at 
court. Sir John Roundtree waited twice upon the 
King : the first time was to welcome him on his 
return, when he rode with a great company of 
loyal Kentish gentlemen to meet "his Majesty at 
Canterbury, and when he saw the royal face, and 
kissed the royal hand, and found a most flattering 
reception ; the second time was when he went up 
to Whitehall, to repay the debt of gratitude he 
owed by saying a good word for Hemingford. 
This second time he had some difficulty in getting 
access to the King, and when he did get it his 
Majesty seemed not to know him, and to be very 
eager to cut the audience short. The worthy 
Kentish knight, though not the quickest of men, 
and not at all given to inquiry or research of any 
kind, soon found out the reason. The King was 
constantly beset by the Cavalier party, who looked 
to his return as the pledge and assurance of wealth 
and honour to each and all of them ; they tired 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 73 

his never very patient ear with their tales of past 
sufferings, and of the sacrifices they had made for 
his father or for himself; and those who had done 
the least, and suffered the least, appeared to expect 
the highest rewards from royal gratitude. Sir 
John fioundtree immediately took boat, returned 
to Erith, and never went near the court again. 
But, through a friend of a more courtly character, 
he had a letter presented to Charles, in which he 
expressed his mixed anger and shame, and pleaded 
for his neighbour Hemingford better than he could 
have done by word of mouth, or in a less excited 
state of feeling. In this letter he never once made 
allusion to his numerous sufferings and sacrifices 
for the royal cause ; he did not remind the King 
that his only son, and his only child, had perished 
in his prime of youth ; nor did he tell Charles how 
often since his father's execution he had complied 
with the request of his circular letters for loans of 
money — thereby not merely pinching himself, but 
also exposing himself to confiscation and imprison- 
ment. He could have sent the spendthrift Sove- 
reign more than a dozen of his autograph letters, 
written during his exile, and running in the ordi- 
nary style — " I have had so good testimony of 
your affection to the King, my dear father of 
blessed memory, that I desire you on this present 
occasion to lend me two hundred pounds, whereof 
I promise you, on my royal word, very faithful re- 
payment/' 

But while others, who had kept larger estates, 
and who had not contributed half so much to the 
wants of the royal wanderer, and who had not given 
it with a tithe of his good -will, preserved all these 
things as vouchers, and frequently exhibited them 



74 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

to the restored king, to his ministers and others, — 
and when they found, after a long and pertinacious 
trial, that repayment was not to be procured, ex- 
hibited them more publicly as proofs of the royal 
ingratitude and dishonesty, — Sir John Roundtree 
tied all his letters together and threw them into 
the fire, not willing to keep any record of the 
debasement and wretchedness of royalty, and not 
wishing for any repayment from a prince who had 
so many claims to satisfy. In his own epistle to 
the king he merely said that in the troublous times 
which were past he had done his bounden duty and 
no more ; that every English gentleman, in pro- 
portion to his means, ought to have done as much ; 
that his conscience would not have let him know 
peace by day or rest by night if he had done less ; 
and that he had never looked for repayment or 
reward of any kind, either in money, lands, or 
honours. It grieved him, he said, and made him 
blush to think that the motive of his visit to 
Whitehall should be so cruelly misrepresented to 
his Majesty, or so sadly mistaken by him. The 
only favour he had had to ask was in behalf of an 
old friend, Captain Richard Hemingford, who had 
saved him from beggary in the usurper's time ; and 
he had been emboldened to ask this from his con- 
viction that it would benefit his Majesty's govern- 
ment to reconcile an officer of so much distinction, 
and who had so great an influence over the old 
officers and sailors of the navy. Thoughtless, and 
absorbed by the pursuit of pleasure as he was, 
Charles was much struck with the letter of the 
honest Kentish knight, which was so very different 
from those he was constantly receiving. The king 
even sat down to answer the epistle with his own 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 7o 

hand ; but one of his courtiers came in to tell him 
that Lady Castlemaine, in a bewitching new dress, 
was waiting for him in the park, and he threw 
aside the letter, and never thought of finishing it. 
Captain Hemingford, however, so far from being 
disturbed by the Restoration government, was in- 
vited to continue in his Majesty's service ; but, 
seeing too well how shamefully the whole navy 
was now managed, the veteran declined the invita- 
tion. Hemingford did not survive quite two years. 
He left behind him the snug estate which he had 
inherited from his father, and an only child, a 
daughter, then between twelve and thirteen years 
of age. Hemingford was no truckler or time- 
server, and never feared for himself; but when the 
hand of death was upon him he greatly feared for 
the future fate of his young daughter, whose pro- 
perty and beauty must, in those grasping and dis- 
solute days, greatly increase her peril. In the 
belief that his old friend Sir John would be both 
willing and able to perform the trust better than 
any friend of his own fallen and now obnoxious 
party, and that, notwithstanding their differences 
of opinion, there lived not a more honourable, 
high-minded, and kind-hearted man than his neigh- 
bour, who, moreover, had known his child from 
her birth, he entreated Roundtree to be her guar- 
dian, and his executor ; and when Sir John accepted 
the trust, and said, in his plain downright way, that 
Marion should be as his daughter, the veteran 
sailor said he should die easy ; and so he did. 

After sixteen years of widowhood, Sir John 
Roundtree married a second wife ; but this mar- 
riage was only contracted in order that Marion 
Hemingford might be the better attended to. 



76 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

The new Lady Ro and tree came of a good old 
Kentish stock, of the right hue in politics. She 
had been a widow. She was younger than Sir 
John, though not quite so young as she pretended 
to be. The world, which is ever critical about 
second marriages, laughed a little at our knight on 
the first blush of the business, and afterwards 
bestowed some commiseration upon him ; for the 
second Lady Roundtree was not so amiable a 
person or so popular in the neighbourhood as the 
first, and the notion got abroad that the doughty 
old soldier was not only vexed and put out of his 
way by her ladyship's whims and vanities, but was 
even henpecked by her. Her ladyship, however, 
was far from being so bad as people chose to think ; 
and although he was often vexed by her, Sir John 
was the last man in Kent to bear henpecking, or 
to forego the exercise of his supremacy in any 
important concern. It is true that her ladyship 
had a large share of vanity, frivolity, and conceit ; 
that she was always fancying herself a beauty, and 
fifteen years younger than she really was ; and that 
since the king's return, she was constantly pestering 
her lord to have a lodging in London, which he 
detested, and to make a figure at court, which he 
had resolved never to visit again. 

For courts are full of flattery, 

As hath too oft been tried ; 
The city full of wantonness, 

And both are full of pride. 

But then she kept his house in very good order, 
was, on the whole, kind and affectionate to his 
young ward (but for whom she might have re- 
mained a widow still, for all that Sir John would 
ever have said to the contrary), and was the means 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 77 

of bringing such female society to the house as 
Marion Hemingford needed, and of taking her out 
on visits to the few neighbouring gentry. 

Although Lady Roundtree would often affect to 
treat her as a mere child, Marion was at this time 
between seventeen and eighteen years of age. The 
pleasant county of Kent, which had given birth to 
that fairest of maids, who was afterwards wife to 
that conqueror of France, Edward the Black Prince, 
was famed in all times for its fair maids, but it did 
not at this time or in any other contain a fairer girl 
than Marion, or one more gentle and right-hearted. 
In the little world in which she moved— and a little 
world indeed it was, and she had never been beyond 
it or had known any other — she was universally 
beloved, and almost always called " the Fair Maid 
of Kent." 

For some two years past the most copious source 
of uneasiness to good Sir John was the question 
which my lady was continually urging, of how they 
should dispose of the young heiress in marriage. 
Her ladyship's notions ran very high. With such 
an estate as Marion possessed, and with the expecta- 
tions she had (the knight had made no secret of his 
intention to leave her all his property that he could 
bequeath), she might mate with a great lord, and 
wear a coronet, and shine at court. [Here the 
knight invariably said, " The Lord forbid !"] The 
child was rather pretty — her complexion was cer- 
tainly clear and good — and she would lose her 
rusticity in London, It was unluckily true that 
her father had been a Roundhead ; but, still, there 
was no denying that he came of an ancient and 
honourable family — of as old a family as any in 
Kent or the three adjoining counties. Rich, pretty, 

E 



78 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

well born, why shouldn't the chit marry the son of 
a marquis — nay, the son and heir apparent of a 
duke ? Thus reasoned the second Lady Roundtree. 
But there was one strong reason why Marion 
Hemingford should not make any marriage of the 
kind ; she was in love with a plain commoner, she 
had plighted her troth, and was the least likely 
person in the world to change. 

Walter Wynton was the son of another of the 
Commonwealth sea captains, long a shipmate at sea, 
and a near neighbour on shore, of Marion's father. 
Captain Wynton, whose politics were of a sterner 
kind than those of his friend, and who had not sub- 
mitted quite so tranquilly to the inevitable revolu- 
tion which terminated the Commonwealth, was in 
trouble and under sharp persecution at the time 
when Hemingford was dying. But for these cir- 
cumstances Hemingford might possibly have ba- 
lanced between Wynton and Roundtree in his 
choice of a guardian for his infant chilqV, notwith- 
standing his convictions that the laws were weak, 
and that the guardianship and protection of a gen- 
tleman belonging to the triumphant party in the 
state would be more efficacious and powerful than 
those of a republican officer who had resolutely 
adhered to the fallen party. Captain Wynton, 
after much suffering, was allowed to return to his 
home, and to live quietly with Walter, his only 
son ; but persecution could not make a convert of 
him, nor could the shameless exhibitions made by 
the court turn his republicanism into loyalty ; he 
remained a moody, discontented man, and of late 
the humiliation of his country and the disgraces 
put upon his cherished profession had well nigh 
driven him to the brink of madness. Oh ! how he 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 79 

sighed for the past rule of the Protector, and for 
the glorious days of Blake ! Living, as he did, 
near the river, and not far from Deptford Yard 
(nor very far from Sheerness and Chatham), he 
could not remain ignorant of the shameful events 
that were happening ; his house was frequented by 
many old Commonwealth officers, and was not un- 
frequently beset by some of the starving sailors, 
who had served under his honour in the good clays, 
and who knew that his honour would feel for their 
woes, and, as far as he could, relieve them. Wynton 
was thus kept in a state of constant excitement and 
irritation, the effects of which could not but be felt 
by his son. 

Walter Wynton was a serious, meditative, but 
very handsome young man, and one that could be 
lively and gay enough upon occasion. He was now 
in his twenty-fifth year. From his twelfth year 
till his eighteenth, when the Eestoration deprived 
his father of his commission, he had been in the 
navy, and the companion of his father in every 
voyage he made. It was predicted of him by all 
the tars that knew him — and he was known at one 
time to most of the men in the fleet — that master 
Walter, who had taken to the service betimes, 
would make a first-rate officer, and be an admiral 
before he was thirty. The overcasting of this 
bright vision was not an easy thing to bear. Wai- 
ter, like his father, dearly loved his profession ; 
and his country, and the glory of his country's flag 
at sea, he loved with all his heart and with all his 
soul. 

So long as Captain Hemingford lived there was 
the closest intimacy between the two families, and 
master Walter was the first friend of little Marion's 

e 2 



THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 






childhood. Sir John Roundtree would hardly 
share in this intimacy, for he looked upon Wynton 
as a sour and incurable Roundhead, and even as a 
fanatic in republicanism ; but, spite of himself, he 
admired and liked the lad Walter, whom he fre- 
quently met ; and after Hemingford's death, when 
he took his daughter home to his own house, he 
could not do less than invite her neighbour and 
friend master Walter to come and see her from 
time to time. The young man came very frequently, 
and as he became more and more known to his host 
he was liked the better by him ; and after a year 
or so had passed it would have been difficult to say 
whether Sir John or Marion was the more anxious 
for his coming. Walter was a keen sportsman, 
and an adept in all varieties of rural sports — as was 
Sir John, and as all Sir John's forefathers, of whom 
there was any record or tradition, had been. He 
went hunting and fowling with Sir John in the 
autumn and winter seasons ; and in the spring and 
summer they fished together in the Thames, or in 
those pretty tributary streams the Cray and the 
Darent. Walter never refused his company at a race 
or at a match of coursing ; and when people were 
merry at a village fair or wake, at a sheep-shearing 
or harvest-home, if he did not dance much himself, 
he loved to look upon their dancing. He was also 
quietly facetious at times. The knight would often 
say, " This young fellow may be a Roundhead and 
a shade or two more serious than befits one of his 
age and condition ; but devil a bit of the Puritan 
has he in him." Nay, as the times grew worse, or 
as the vices of the restored government became 
more brazen and were more talked of, Sir John 
could even listen patiently to Walter's murmurings 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 81 

against the profligacy of the court, and enter fully 
into his indignant feelings when he spoke of the 
navy and of the dishonoured flag of England ; in- 
variably contriving, however, to end the conversa- 
tion with saying a good word for the King, throw- 
ing the blame on his evil advisers and dishonest 
ministers, and hoping that matters would mend. 

With my lady Walter was never a favourite ; 
for her ladyship loved flattery in large doses, and 
he could never flatter at all. She thought him a 
very unlikely and unapt person to win the heart of 
any woman ; not that she could deny that he had a 
fine manly figure and handsome countenance, but 
she said he always looked starch and severe, and 
had none of the little talk which ladies love to listen 
to. As, for the sake of her own juvenility, she had 
taught herself really to believe that Marion had 
scarcely grown a year older since her marriage with 
Sir John, but still continued a child, she was asto- 
nished, even to the stopping of her breath, when 
the knight one day not long ago, being wearied 
Avith her ambitious schemes for his ward and her 
talk about coronets and court, told her rather pet- 
tishly that she might put all such nonsense out of 
her head, as he believed that Marion had already 
made up her mind on that particular, and that 
Walter Wynton would be Marion's husband as 
surely as he, Sir John, had the honour of calling 
her ladyship his wife. As soon as the dame reco- 
vered her breath and speech, she said that this was 
wonderful news indeed, and rather too wonderful 
to be true ; that it was impossible the child could 
so much as have given such matters a thought ; 
but then she said that if she had, it was forward and 
shameful in her, and that such notions ought to be 



82 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY, 

driven out of her head, as in all worshipful families 
loves and matches and matrimony were managed 
by the parents or guardians of the young ladies. 
" Doubtless," replied Sir John, " this hath been the 
general rule, but there are exceptions — there will 
be exceptions — there have been exceptions — my 
first wife was an exception, seeing that she would 
marry me, though only the son of a plain Kentish 
knight, when her mother, and her maiden aunt, 
and the whole family conclave had settled that she 
w r as to marry a much greater personage." 

" But, dear Sir John," said her ladyship, " you 
do not approve of this independence and indis- 
cipline in young girls?" 

"I approved of it very much once" replied the 
knight, " and she who exercised her own free will 
never gave me cause to repent that she had exer- 
cised it in my favour." 

" But consider, dear Sir John, this Walter 
Wynton is a Roundhead, and the son of a man 
notoriously disaffected to our most gracious sove- 
reign — a man who, apart from that rank in the 
service which he has forfeited, would only take 
rank with a second or third rate Kentish squire. 
Surely you can never seriously think of giving the 
child, with her competent estate and good expecta- 
tions, to. a Roundhead ! It is against your known 
principles, Sir John." 

The knight fidgeted and looked rather confused ; 
the lady followed up her attack by representing 
that Captain Wynton was one of the most sullen 
and desperate of the surviving republican faction — 
that he was a near relation to one of the regicides, 
and had been the bosom friend of several of those 
king-killers— that he was a man of that temper that 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 83 

was sure to involve himself in some new trouble, 
and that his son, who took so little care to conceal 
his sentiments, would be involved in his father's 
ruin. Her ladyship scarcely stopped until she 
brought both father and son to the scaffold, and 
put poor Marion in widow's weeds. 

" Hark ye, madam," s*aid Sir John, u my prin- 
ciples are unchanged and unchangeable. I love 
not Roundheads, albeit but for one of that classis 
of men I should not be where I now am. But I 
like this manly, right-English youth ; and think, 
nay feel sure, his principles may be changed by 
time and experience. If I could have chosen, per- 
haps I would have ordered things otherwise, and 
have had the girl married to some man of undoubted 
loyalty, some honest and virtuous cavalier, if any 
such be left in the world in these corrupted times. 
But there again I have my scruples, for I promised 
to my old friend and benefactor, on his death-bed, 
that I would act by Marion as a father ; and I am 
certain that if Hemingford were living, Walter 
"Wynton is on every account the very man to whom 
he would give his daughter and estate. But then 
again, it behoves me to look well to the safety and 
happiness of my ward, and the security of her 
estate. There is an ugly chance, indeed, that the 
mutinies of our sailors, the general discontent of 
the people, the wickedness of those who mislead his 
Majesty, may encourage the Roundheads to under- 
take some high-flying enterprise — and in that case 
methinks Captain Wynton would be very likely — 
very likely indeed, to be in the head of the insur- 
rection. And will Walter keep aloof when his 
father is engaged ? Not he ; not he ! . . . Then 
will Walter Wynton be by the fact in the position 



84 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

of my personal enemy, for come what may the 
King must be supported ; and then will follow 
troubles and woes, ruin to Walter, and .... No ! 
by the duty I owe to Hemingford, by the love I 
bear his child, who has become as dear to me as if 
she were my daughter, I will not give my consent 
to this union until the country be more settled, or 
until I see some notable change in the politics of 
Wynton Lodge !" 

Lady Eoundtree expressed herself well pleased 
with this determination. 

" But,'' continued Sir John, " your ladyship 
will please bear in mind that I will have no co- 
ercion, and much less any trick or manoeuvre 
practised upon my ward. Were I to cause her to 
shed a tear, by my soul I should expect to see her 
father's ghost appear to upbraid me ! Your ladyship 
knows the extent of my obligations to Hemingford. 
Vex not the dear child by showing discourtesy to 
Walter, or by talking about coronets and baubles 
which Marion will never wear, nor wish to wear." 

The good knight was much excited. His lady 
declared that she had never vexed the child's ear 
with any such talk (which was not quite true), 
and that she ever had and ever would set her face 
against coercion, and tricks, and manoeuvres (which 
was still less true). 

The last time that Sir Ealph Spicer had been 
down at Erith to visit his cousin Sir John, whom 
he had not seen for many a year, that needy 
courtier, chiefly through the gossip and confidential 
communications of my Lady Eoundtree, had made 
himself well acquainted with Marion's history, and 
wi th the rent-roll of her estate ; and he was not 
without his hopes of dazzling the young rustic, 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 85 

con verting Marion Hemingford into my Lady 
Spicer, and revelling on the produce of her good, 
broad, Kentish acres. The egregious folly and 
vanity of Lady Roundtree had given him en- 
couragement and some opportunity. Her ladyship 
had been charmed almost out of her senses by his 
gallantry and court impudence, by the delicious 
Whitehall news he gave her, and by the pleasant 
stories he told about Lady Castlemaine, the fair 
Mistress Stuart, and other mistresses or favourites 
of the King ; about this lord's intrigue and that 
lord's duel, and other edifying things of the same 
courtly description. What Walter Wynton could 
not do at all, Sir Ralph Spicer could do in the 
greatest perfection : he had given her ladyship 
doses of flattery large enough to choke ten ordinary 
ladies, and seeing that she took them all and gloated 
upon them, he had absolutely proceeded to the 
length of making love to her ladyship. 

What ! make love to his cousin's wife ? Ay — 
and Sir Ralph was a spark that would have had no 
scruple to make love to the wife of his own brother ! 
And there were many Sir Ralphs in the court of 
Charles the Second. Such were the promising vices 
which our exiled king and cavaliers had imported 
from France, with French dresses and fashions, 
French plays, French poetry, French everything ! 

But in this case Sir Ralph's love-making was 
but sham love, adopted partly as a capriccio, and 
partly, as he thought, to serve a purpose profitable 
to himself. Her ladyship, in the warmth of her 
confidence, had lamented the obstinacy of Sir John 
in leading a recluse life in Kent, and had opened 
to him her grand plan of marrying in due course 
of time the child Marion to some illustrious noble- 

e 3 



86 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

man. Living out of the world as she was con- 
strained to do, she had small opportunity for 
forwarding her project ; a live lord scarcely passed 
through Erith once in half a dozen years, except it 
was my Lord Say and Sele, and he had got a wife 
already, and was little better than a Roundhead 
and Puritan ; but Sir Ralph Spicer, the gay and 
gallant Sir Ralph (her ladyship could give compli- 
ments as well as take them), a courtier who knew 
every great lord and lady at court, a friend of the 
King, a friend of his Grace of Buckingham, of 
George Etherege and Sir Charles Sedley, a man 
who played at Orestes and Pylades with the gay 
Lord Buckhurst, and who was familiar with every 
other lord and courtier, must have abundance of 
opportunities of promoting the plan upon which 
her ladyship had set her heart. And Sir Ralph 
had given her ladyship his word that he would 
move in this behalf, and find a lord for the little 
girl. After this satisfactory pledge to the old lady, 
he had seized the very first opportunity of declaring 
an outrageous passion of love to the young one. 
Poor Marion, who had never seen such a specimen 
of humanity, thought he was crazed : — and crazed 
no doubt he was, crazed then and always with 
vanity and drink, by presumption and debauchery. 
At first she met his hyperbolical expressions with 
laughter, but when he grew more stormy and im- 
pudent, she turned away from him with silent 
scorn. A man so confident was not to be checked 
or humbled so easily. He had found another meet 
opportunity of playing the part of the amorous 
swain ; and then Marion had reminded him of a 
fact which he had altogether forgotten or disre- 
garded — that is, that he was old enough to be her 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 87 

father ; and she had then told him, with very un- 
pleasant frankness, that it assorted ill with his years 
to play such fantastic tricks before a Kentish 
maiden in her teens. After that last scene she had 
taken good care to avoid him, and to secure herself 
from his impertinent intrusion ; and she had 
scarcely spoken a word to him during the rest 
of that visit. Sir Ralph nevertheless had gone 
back to London with the confident assurance that 
by and through the very credulous and awkwardly 
manoeuvring Lady Roundtree, he might turn 
Marion Hemingford to good account, either by 
marrying her himself, or by acting as matrimonial 
broker for somebody else. Her ladyship, at this 
time, had never once thought of the possibility of 
an attachment existing between Walter and her 
husband's ward. Sir John's explanatory conver- 
sation had taken place some weeks after the de- 
parture of his cousin from Erith, a welcome 
departure to Sir John, although it cost him a good 
many gold pieces. Sir Ralph had promised very 
faithfully to repay the money, but Sir John had 
not been much disappointed at never having got 
it. In London, and in the courtly air of Saint 
James's, our cavalier had soon forgotten the fair 
maid of Kent, his coquetry with Lady Roundtree, 
and his promises to her ; for other game had 
started, of which the pursuit seemed less difficult ; 
and it was not in the nature of these gallants to be 
steady or persevering in anything, — no, not even 
in mischief! "When, however, the court had come 
to discuss the question of the seizure of Tom of 
the Woods, Sir Ralph's thoughts had been carried 
back to Erith, and to the pretty little projects he 
had conceived while there. He had volunteered 



88 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

his services to the King, who wished the arrest to 
be made without noise, telling his Majesty about 
his worshipful cousin Sir John, who was a cavalier 
to the backbone, and in the commission of the 
peace for that part of Kent where the dangerous 
prophet had so long been hiding. Years before 
this his Majesty had forgotten everything about 
Sir John Roundtree ; but Sir Ralph's relationship 
with that worthy magistrate might facilitate the 
great enterprise in hand ; and his Majesty had 
therefore intrusted the mission to our precious 
rake, who had served him before in a capacity far 
more dishonourable even than that of a runner 
or common thief-taker. Sir Ralph had thought 
that this present state business, if well managed by 
him, might lead to some fixed office or salary ; and 
some of the King's merry counsellors had told 
him, as an encouragement, that if he gagged and 
caged the prophet, he should have some immediate 
reward. 

Marion, keeping a secret from him for the first 
time in her life, had not told Walter Wynton 
anything about the extravagant behaviour and im- 
pertinence of her good old guardian's reprobate 
cousin ; for she knew that Walter might attach 
more importance to it than it merited, that Walter 
would be sure to be vexed and irritated, and that 
Walter, though so quiet and composed, had a fiery 
spirit within him. Since that unpleasant visitation 
the poor girl had been somewhat distressed by 
seeing, or fancying, that Sir John Roundtree was 
not quite so cordial with Walter Wynton as he 
had used to be. She, however, knew that the mind 
of the good old knight was disturbed by the aspect 
of public affairs, and by the exceedingly great diffi- 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 89 

culty he found in answering the angry arguments of 
some of his neighbours, and in excusing royalty ;. 
for politics, which had been in a great measure 
excluded from this quiet corner of Kent, now 
forced themselves upon the attention of all men. 
For some time past there had been no looking 
down from the green hills upon the flowing river, 
without seeing some evidence of disaster and dis- 
grace, of interrupted commerce, of starvation and 
mutiny. Erith was an exposed position ; the storm 
was at its very doors. 

Things were in this state when Sir Ralph Spicer 
arrived at his cousin's mansion in the manner which 
has been described. Her ladyship gently reproached 
him for his so long absence and neglect in writing - T 
but he pleaded his busy avocations at court, and 
made a triumphant peace by whistling Faittout to 
bring in the ape and the parrot. Lady Roundtree 
was enchanted with the monkey, and Marion was 
not at all transported by the present of the talking- 
bird. The parrot, however, was left in the saloon, 
while the monkey was sent down to the kitchen 
with Faittout. As the cavalier made no secret of 
his hunger, as it wanted some hours of supper-time, 
and as it was the rule of the house to lay meat and 
drink before the stranger immediately after his 
arrival, a good meal was served up for Sir Ralph. 
When he had eaten his fill, and had, with the 
occasional assistance of Sir John, finished two good 
bottles of claret, and not until then, he put on his 
business face, and told his host and cousin, in the 
hearing of the ladies, that he had come hurriedly 
down into Kent upon a state matter, a very im- I 
portant state matter which nearly concerned the 
King's majesty, who had himself sent him, and in 



90 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

which he, Sir John, might render good service to 
his Majesty. 

" I am ever ready to do that last," said Sir 
John : " Tell me, cousin, what it is I can do for 
the King I" 

Sir Ralph, looking still more important and 
solemn, said, " Cousin, it is a matter of high con- 
cernment, and must be handled in secret. When 
state matters are to be treated — when the salvation 
of the king's crown is at issue, gallantry must give 
way to duty — Lady Roundtree, and you, Mistress 
Marion, will pardon me if I crave Sir John's ear 
in the library for one half-hour." 

The ladies smiled and bowed an assent ; the elder 
lady, who was burning to know what the state 
matter could be, greatly praising Sir Ralph's dis- 
cretion. Sir John forthwith led his cousin to the 
library, a fine old wainscoted room, with a few 
family pictures in it, and shelves, and books, not 
a volume among them being of less size than a 
folio, nor of later date than the reign of James I. 
Marion, happy to be released, walked out into the 
garden ; Lady Roundtree would have run to the 
library door to listen ; but Sir John, who really 
expected some most important communication, 
cautiously turned the key of the door of an outer 
room, and so her ladyship found that she could 
hear nothing. Sir John being seated on one oak 
chair, and Sir Ralph being seated upon another 
directly opposite to him, the solemn conference 
opened. The courtier made a great many flourishes, 
ran into a vast deal of extraneous matter, and kept 
from the main point considerably more than half 
an hour ; but the secret came out at last, and great 
was the astonishment and mortification of Sir John 



THE OLD CA.VALIER. 91 

upon finding that the great state business in which 
he was to take a part was nothing more than the 
seizure of a mad fanatic who told fortunes, and 
uttered what were called prophecies. He thought 
that the King might have put some better service 
upon a man of condition like himself, who had 
fought for his royal father in half a score of battles. 
He was irritated. 

" Cousin," said he, " if half be true that men do 
say, it is not the seizing of this moon-struck hermit 
that will save the State. But since it seems to be 
thought otherwise at Whitehall, let Tom of the 
Woods be seized in God's name. You have, of 
course, the secretary's warrant for his arrest ?" 

" The devil a warrant have I," responded Sir 
Ralph. " My commission was given me all of a 
hurry, and between night and morning in the 
matted gallery. Besides, Government wishes the 
thing to be done quietly, and mayhap would not 
like to appear in it." 

" Hem ! Such appearance would not add to its 
dignity," quoth Hound tree ; " but by what autho- 
rity is the lunatic to be seized ?" 

" By the authority of your own and special 
warrant, cousin Sir John. I told the King that 
you were in the commission of the peace in these 
parts, and it was upon my so saying that his 
Majesty was pleased most graciously to say that 
you were the truest and best cavalier in all Kent, 
and that he could be sure of your doing the business 
discreetly and quietly." 

" His Majesty," quoth Sir John, bowing reve- 
rentially as if the king were present, " too much 
honours me by his remembrance of me ; but I 
should have thought that I had long since been 



92 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

forgotten in those quarters. But to the matter, 
cousin Ralph : I must needs tell you that I relish 
it not. This Tom of Bedlam, or Tom of the 
Woods, whom I have various times seen, and with 
"whom I have had some talk, may be a mad man, 
but he cannot be called a bad man. I would not 
willingly be the means of throwing him into prison. 
I confess that neither in the old time, in the days 
of the King's father, nor now, in the days of his 
Majesty, did I ever see any good done to the 
common weal by imprisoning and persecuting 
these poor deluded enthusiasts, or by scourging 
them, or by cutting off their noses or ears. 
Cousin, you know, or ought to know, my high- 
church principles, but there are times when I 
cannot help thinking that if Archbishop Laud had 
left Prynne's and Bastwick's ears upon their heads, 
he would not have been brought to lay his own 
head upon the block !" 

" But, Sir John, the King's majesty doth say 
that it is all through the foresayings of this Tom 
of the Woods that the fanatics in London be so 
.riotous and the sailors so mutinous." 

-$* I opine," quoth Roundtree, " that those unpaid 
tickets, and want and hunger, have a good deal 
more to do with the mutinies of the seamen than 
have the predictions of Tom of the Woods. If the 
King's majesty could but spend a little less among 
his courtiers and his " 

" Od's blood ! cousin John, his religious Majesty 
hath not given me a doit, as I have a soul to be 
saved ! and, what with this whole niggardly and 
iialf-puritanical parliament, which he prorogues 
and prorogues but is afear'd to dissolve, lest he 
should be forced to call another and get a worse 



THE OLD CAVALIER. 93 

one, and what with this thing and that thing, and 
the miscalculations attending this beggarly war, 
there's no money in the treasury to pay anybody. 
The sailors may eat their tickets, and feed their 

wives and children upon them as they can 

But this is not to the point : it is thought by the 
King's majesty and by his government that the 
sailors would be quiet, or quieter than they are, if 
this fanatical prophet were laid by the heels, and 
deprived of his gift of prophesying. The tickets 
cannot be paid, but Tom can be imprisoned ; 
therefore let that be done which can be done, and 
do you, Sir John, issue your warrant forthwith, as 
you love the King." 

" I must both issue it and execute it," said Sir 
John ; "for Tom of the Woods stands well with 
all the people hereabout, and there is hardly a man, 
not excepting even mine own constable, that would 
willingly take him into custody. If Tom had lived 
two or three centuries ago, he would have been 
conceited into a saint. In truth, his life is very 
simple, harmless, and holy-looking ! He does evil 
to no man, he offends the laws in no particular. 
The law hath no hold on him ; Cousin Ralph, I 
foresee mischief if we attempt to trouble him. 
Yes, I tell you I foresee mischief and even insur- 
rection among these commons of Kent, for he hath 
singularly endeared himself unto them." 

"It is not for a Roundtree to fear" said Sir 
Ealph, making up his heroical face ; " it is not for 
you, my right worshipful cousin, to hesitate when 
the King commands" 

" Cousin Ralph," said Sir John, " I fear not for 
myself, and I will not disobey his Majesty, albeit I 
should have liked some warrant from him, and 



94 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. ' 

cannot like the duty put upon me. You are sure, 
perfectly sure, that the King said the thing ought 
to be done by me?" 

Sir Ralph very solemnly vowed that it was so. 

" Then," quoth Roundtree, " since it must be, 
the sooner it is done the better. I will draw out a 
warrant, and go myself with Roger Hinde, mine 
own confidential serving-man, and see it executed ; 
for otherwise methinks it may chance not to be 
executed at all. You will come with me, Sir 
Ralph, into the woods ? — it is but a short and 
pleasant walk hence to the place which Tom 
makes his haunt. ,, 

" Sir John, the sun is sinking — it will soon be 
night — to-morrow morning will be time enough — 
I have had a wearying day in the service of the 
State, and would fain rest where I am, and divert 
the ladies. Consider, too, the presence of a 
stranger of quality like myself might make a stir 
through the country side ! In every way I am 
better where I am. But to-morrow morning will 
be time enough." 

As Sir John looked into Sir Ralph's face he 
could not avoid the thought, that whatever the 
Roundtrees might be, there was a Spicer in the 
world that looked at this moment very like a 
shuffler and coward ; but he said nothing, except 
that he would go and get through the business 
himself, without any loss of time. And having 
drawn out a warrant, and summoned Roger Hinde, 
the stout old knight sallied forth from the mansion, 
leaving Sir Ralph to divert the ladies, and to tell 
them (if he should so choose) the real nature of 
the mission he had come upon. 



( 95 ) 



CHAPTER V. 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 



Sir John Roundtree had not got many yards from 
his own door ere he met the Erith constable, Mike 
Woodenspoon, who was going round the hill upon 
some weighty concernments, for Mike, besides 
being constable, was chief shaver and hair-trimmer 
to the whole of the little district, and held the 
ancient and important office of " Ale-conner," or 
" kenner " or " taster " of ale ; and not a drop of 
that liquor could be vended in any part of the 
parish, either in the village or in the upland, 
until he had tasted it and declared it to be good 
and fit to be drunk by his majesty's lieges. In the 
performance of these last-mentioned official duties, 
which he was never known to neglect, he had 
grown very corpulent and rather short-winded, 
and was not altogether without symptoms of gout 
in the toes ; but it was thought that the size of his 
belly and the slowness of his walk added very 
materially to his constabulary dignity. As Mike 
was quite alone, and as our good knight and justice 
of the peace thought it would be better to proceed 
with the legal regularity, he said to the shaver, 
" Mike, follow me ; I want you to serve a 
warrant." Mike touched his cap, and said he 
would follow his honour to the world's end ; but 
warrants being very rare things at Erith, and Mike 



96 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

having a great deal of natural and professional 
curiosity, could not but ask Sir John who it was 
that was to be taken up. When our knight named 
Tom of the Woods, the barber stood aghast, and 
for some time could not speak at all. When Mike 
found his tongue, he said that he would sooner dig 
up his old father out of his grave than put Tom in 
prison ; that he would sooner serve a warrant upon 
the Archbishop of Canterbury in the midst of his 
clergy in Canterbury Cathedral, or even upon the 
Lord Mayor of London himself between his men in 
armour, and in the midst of his aldermen in their 
wigs and formalities, than serve one upon Tom of 
the Woods in his wilderness, for Tom was an awful 
man and he feared him, and Tom had a tail of 
followers which reached all the way from Holly- 
hill Wood to Greenwich Park, and a great deal 
farther. The knight reminded the barber of his 
oaths of office, and told him that the warrant must 
be served forthwith, and that he himself would 
stand by. Mike, who had been at one period of 
his life a candle-snuffer at the Globe theatre, took 
off his cap with his left hand, laid his right hand 
upon his heart, and said that he must needs keep 
his constable oath, and that if the King's majesty 
and his worshipful master Sir John called for his 
services in this particular, he would go serve the 
warrant even though he died for it. But the bar- 
ber's knees almost knocked together as he said the 
words. 

" A fiddlestick for your dying," quoth Sir John ; 
u there will be no dying or killing in this matter ! 
Tom of the Woods will demean himself gently in 
my presence, and where is the Kentish man in 
these parts that will offer wrong to Sir John 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 97 

Roundtree, or to any man acting with him or 
under his warrant ? Follow me, Mike Wooden- 
spoon, and if you meet with any of your gossips, 
say not a word of the business we have in hand." 

The knight strode on, and Mike falling in the 
rear marched after him with Roger Hinde, the 
serving-man, who liked the business no better than 
Mike did, having the same awe of Tom's super- 
natural character, and the same dread that a tu- 
mult would follow Tom's arrest. Sir John walked 
so fast that the constable and ale-conner had much 
ado to keep up with him ; yet Mike not only spoke 
about Tom, but also spoke professionally to the 
old butler about the knight's ale-casks. As they 
went along they were seen by divers country -people 
who were going into Erith, and who as soon as 
they got there reported that Sir John Roundtree 
and his man Roger, and Constable Woodenspoon, 
were walking towards the woods, and walking very 
fast indeed, as if they had something to do of great 
weight and urgency. This note was quite enough 
to rouse curiosity, and several of the villagers 
forthwith set out to follow on the footsteps of our 
knight and party. 

It was, as Sir John had told his cousin, only a 
short and pleasant walk to Tom's Dodona. It was 
a very pleasant walk through winding lanes, hedged 
in with briar and honeysuckle, through two or 
three thickets, and over two or three gentle hills, 
which afforded from their tops glimpses of the 
broad river, and which had at their feet clear and 
prattling little brooks, that were running and 
skipping to the Thames. These little hill- tops 
and openings in the thickets afforded also views of 



98 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

the woods, marshes, and meadows of Essex, and of 
the little old village of Dagenham, with the low 
red roofs of its houses shining in the setting sun. 
The trio, bound on justice business, were soon at 
the edge of the wood. Sir John, though not in- 
sensible to the stillness and solemnity of the place, 
entered without hesitation by a narrow winding 
path ; but Mike and Hoger hesitated and stopped 
at the edge of the wood, each putting his open 
palm above his eyebrows, and looking under it 
into the brown and misty atmosphere. When they 
had gazed thus for awhile without seeing anything 
but the trees, and the fern that grew under the trees, 
and some squirrels that were nimbly running up 
the stems of the trees, the barber and waiting-man 
entered the wood and walked at a smart pace to 
come up with the knight, who had never missed 
them. The almost horizontal rays of the sun found 
their way into the wood but only for a short dis- 
tance, when the trees were found to grow so closely 
together and the foliage was so thick, that scarcely 
a ray could penetrate, and hardly a glimpse could 
be gotten of the sky. Here that brown and misty 
hue which reigns in such places was browner and 
more vapoury. It was a most solemn spot ; it was 
the centre of a world of gnarled trunks, wide- 
spreading branches, and thick leaves. There was 
no sound. A forest roaring with the tempest is 
sublime, trees moaning in the evening wind give a 
melancholy, soul-touching note ; but there is 
something more touching, more melancholy, more 
awful than these — and that is the inmost heart of 
a forest on a calm summer's eve. 

Stopping under a strange blighted tree, Sir John 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 99 

said, " This should be near the place. Shout, my 
good fellows, and then, good Mike, do your duty 
and fear not." 

Never was there a more lamentable attempt at 
a shout than that which the two men uttered ; awe 
and fear choked their voices, and made them look 
so pale and ghostly that a stout-hearted man might 
have been startled at the sight of them, had he 
come suddenly upon them in that solemn place. 

" Tom must be near indeed, if he can hear those 
piping voices of yours," said Sir John. " What 
ails you ? Shout, Mike, shout ! Roger, give 
tongue !" 

The barber and the serving-man tried again, 
but it was again but a poor and weak Holla ! that 
they could give. The knight grew impatient, 
and raising his own firm and manful voice, he made 
the thick wood re-echo with his " Holla ! holla ! 
holla ! Tom of the "Woods come forth !" 

Presently a rustling was heard among the trees, 
and footsteps among the fern, and a deep voice 
which said " I corneal I come ! I come ! and the 
judgment is a-coming !" and in the next instant 
Tom of the Woods stood close by the side of our 
knight. The barber and the serving-man shook 
in their shoes. In truth, f the woodland seer, in 
such a place, was an awful sight to look upon. He 
was a tall, gaunt, thin man, clad in a long black 
riding-cloak, much stained and tattered ; his head 
was without any covering, and almost bald, but he 
had cultivated a beard with singular success, for it 
was thick and shaggy, and reached nearly to his 
girdle ; his legs beyond the mantle or cloak w 7 ere 
naked, and instead of shoes he wore rough sandals. 
He carried neither staff nor sword — he had nothing 



100 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

in his right hand but a small black book — but no 
one could look at him without seeing that a sword 
or any implement of war in such a right hand as 
his would be a fearful weapon. It was also easy 
to see that Tom had dealt in pikes and trenchant 
blades at some period of his life : on his bald fore- 
head just above the left temple there was a long, 
broad, and deep scar ; and on the same side of the 
head, between the cheek-bone and the beard, there 
were the signs of another portentous gash. Our 
hermit, indeed, had a hybrid look, being very 
like a cross between a monk and a man-at-arms, or 
a hermit and a dragoon. The long riding-cloak 
and Tom's manner of wearing it assisted no doubt 
in giving him this mixed character ; but Tom had 
really been one of Oliver Cromwell's Ironsides, 
and as doughty and fearless a one as ever rode with 
the Protector. He stood erect and looked calmly 
in the face of Sir John, as if he expected the 
knight to speak first ; but as Sir John did not 
open his lips, Tom of the Woods, not roughly or 
rudely, but with a gentle voice said, " Here am I ; 
you called me from my evening meditation : what 
would ye have of me — in what can I serve you, 
Sir John Roundtree ? " 

The knight, who more than ever hated the task 
which had been forced upon him, looked round to 
Constable "Woodenspoon, and intimated by several 
hems and nods that he ought to speak and stand 
forward with the warrant he held in his hand. 
But Mike could neither speak nor move ; and thus 
Sir John found himself under the necessity of tell- 
ing the hermit that his alarming prophecies had 
excited the suspicions of certain persons well af- 
fected to the State 3 and had induced him to issue 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 101 

a warrant for his apprehension, in order that he 
might be examined. Tom listened calmly'; and re- 
plied without any anger, or any visible emotion, 
that he had expected such a summons, that he had 
had a vision, and that he was ready to go again 
into prison for righteousness' sake, being well as- 
sured, and by heavenly relations, that the iron 
bars were not forged, nor the fetters made, that 
could restrain him long. By this time Mike had 
grown bold enough to step within ten yards of the 
hermit, and to show him the warrant by holding it 
out at arm's length. 

" 'Tis well," said Tom ; " put up the paper, I 
need it not, I am ready to go whithersoever Sir 
John chooses. The law cannot hurt me, nor can 
the law-makers or law-breakers." And then turn- 
ing to the knight, he said in a milder tone, u This 
is not your doing, Sir John Roundtree ; you have 
been put upon this thing by men who live not at 
Erith or anywhere in Kent, but at Whitehall ;" 
and then speaking in a whisper in the knight's ear, 
he added, " Your ungodly kinsman, Sir Ralph 
Spicer, has been sent down by the court to compass* 
my arrest." 

" Was that also in your vision ?" said Sir John, 
somewhat startled. 

" Ay," replied Tom of the Woods, " and a 
great deal more than that : but let them repent, 
let them all repent, for I say again the judgment of 
the Lord is at hand, more terrible than the judg- 
ment of fire and plague !" 

The instant that Tom began to prophesy/ his 
countenance, which before had been perfectly calm, 
became flushed and excited, his eyes flashed, and 
his tall figure seemed to grow still taller and more 

F 



102 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

erect. Mike and Roger trembled and shrunk within 
themselves, and went behind a tree to avoid the 
fearful sight. Sir John, who had seen him thus 
before, said nothing but " God forefend ! God fore- 
fend ! But judgment or no judgment, follow me 
to Elite." 

Our knight then began to walk back by the way 
he had come. The seer followed him in silence, 
and thereupon, encouraged by the meekness of his 
deportment, the constable and his serving-man, 
though still trembling, followed the seer. Sir John 
had a good sword by his side, and old as he was 
growing, he was still a match for most men (as for 
any assistance from constable or servant, he might 
as well have expected it from the timid little 
squirrels) ; but Tom of the Woods had no mis- 
chief in his head of that sort. All went as quietly 
as a funeral procession until they came near to the 
edge of the wood ; but there they were met by 
some score of peasants, who, having finished their 
daily labours, were going to Tom's temple and 
confessional for some ghostly comfort or discom- 
fort, as many of the people of the neighbouring 
country had been in the habit of doing for a long 
time past. These rustics bowed to Sir John, and 
gave him the good evening with all due reverence; 
but when they saw the constable, they suspected 
what was in the wind, &nd some of them began to 
cry, " Whither away, Tom ; whither away, Tom of 
the Woods ? We were coming unto you to make 
some more repentance." 

" Brethren," said Tom, " depart in peace, for I 
am now in the grip of the world's law." 

" What 's that to the law of the saints," said 
one of the fellows who had been most seriously 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 103 

infected by Tom's fanaticism. " Heed it not, 
Tom of the Woods ! We will stand by you even 
though it be against this worshipful knight, who 
hath not joined in the revelry and wickedness of 
the times, and who ever yet hath been the poor 
Kentish man's friend." 

At this very moment the people who had come 
out from Erith reached the spot. Except a few of 
the rougher sort who dwelt down by the river side, 
and who lived more upon water than upon land, 
they all doffed their caps to our knight ; but at the 
same time they seemed to be grieved and even 
angry at what he was doing, and they joined the 
other party in saying that Tom of the Woods 
should not be sent to prison. Sir John was about 
to address them, when the prophet held up his 
right hand and spake. 

" Peace, brothers and "children,' ' said Tom ; 
" Peace and submission ! The time hath long been 
that those who persecute God's true servants, and 
seek to kill them, think they do the State good 
service. But this worthy knight, however mis- 
taken in other particulars, and however hood- 
winked he may be, hath never been of that number. 
Do him, therefore, no wrong in hindering that 
which he hath in hand, and which by the light that 
is in me I do know he hath unwillingly undertaken. 
JLet me go whithersoever he will take me. This 
bondage will be short. I shall be free and back 
to the woods again. This I tell ye all ; and when 
did ye know me to be a false prophet ? " 

This tranquillized most of the multitude, and 
they were clearing the path, when a sour old 
fisherman who had been present at the arrival and 
landing of Sir Ralph Spicer, said doggedly, " Tom 

f2 



104 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

of the Woods, you know not all the danger you 
are in. There 's a hell-rake of a courtier that hath 
come down from London, and " 

" I knew of that coming before you did,'' said 
the prophet, " and I tell ye that neither that jack- 
anapes nor those that sent him can for this present 
do me any harm." 

"You know best," said the surly man, "but 
may I be cursed, or pressed into the navy to starve, 
an there were but a few here of my mind, if I 
would allow thee to run so much as the risk of 
being mistreated by that courtier's tongue. Com- 
rades, I say that Tom of the Woods ought to stay 
where he is, or go farther into the Weald ; and 
that we ought to see to it." 

Several of the rougher sort showed an inclination 
to be violent. As all violent passions are infec- 
tious, this might have spread ; but the hermit, 
letting the Ironside part of his character get the 
ascendant, caught the sour old fisherman by his 
jacket, and shook him till his bones rattled, calling 
him all the while a doubter and unbeliever, a god- 
less man that was setting himself in opposition to 
destiny and prophecy. After this there was no 
more opposition to Tom's removal, and the whole 
and now rather numerous party quitted the wood 
and walked across the hills to Sir John's mansion. 
By the time they got there it was night ; but the 
moon had risen. Sir Ralph, being much dis- 
quieted by that great concourse of people, did not 
come out to meet his cousin. Sir John found him 
diverting her ladyship with court anecdotes, which, 
in his old-fashioned way, he considered as very 
improper entertainment for the ears of a modest 
woman. A cloud was on Sir John's brow as he 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 105 

said, " Sir Ralph, I have done what the King hath 
put upon me. Tom of the Woods is here in cus- 
tody ; but now we have got him, what shall we do 
with him?" 

" Oh !" quoth Sir Ealph, " send the fanatic to 
prison." 

" But the law, cousin Ralph, require th some 
previous examination. I see we shall get no good 
by it, nor by any part of these proceedings ; but 
the forms must be gone through with. Sir Ralph, 
I expect that you will attend me during this 
examination." 

" Is the fanatic well bound and ironed ? They are 
dangerous neighbours when the fit is upon them." 

" I have put neither cords nor chains upon, the 
man. There might have been danger in trying to 
do it." 

"Then, Sir John, my good cousin, as the King's 
majesty wishes this matter to be done off-hand and 
as quietly as possible, and without appearing in it, 
I think I had better not show myself in the justice- 
room." 

u As for that, Sir Ralph, Tom knew of your 
coming before you got here ; and now the people 
all know that you are here, and that the court hath 
sent you to procure his arrest. Come, then, and 
help me in this examination." 

Sir Ralph very reluctantly followed Sir John to 
the library. The prisoner was brought in by poor 
Mike, the terrified constable; and a few of the 
people were admitted, the rest being recommended 
to the care of Roger Hinde, and to the knight's 
ale-casks. The lamp on the justice- table scarcely 
gave so much light as the broad full moon 
that shone through the bay-window : Tom thus 



106 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

appeared a few shades more awful than he had 
done in the thick wood. Sir Ralph got behind 
the high table, and seated himself close by the 
side of Sir John, who opened an enormous folio 
volume, containing abstracts of statutes, with di- 
rections to justices of the peace : he kept turning 
the pages over and over, but was excessively puzzled 
how to begin. Although he had been in the 
commission of the peace good seven years, he had 
never had such a case to deal with. And of law, 
to say the truth, he knew but little. He knew of 
some statutes asrainst witchcraft — and he had a 
proper respect for them — but he knew of none 
against prophesying, except an old one of the time 
of Henry the Eighth, against prophesying the 
king's death — which the prisoner was never known 
to have done. At last he made a desperate leap 
in the middle, and said, " Tom of the Woods, dost 
know why thou art here?" 

" Because it is the will of the Lord, and because 
the spirit of prophecy hath been put in me/' replied 
Tom. 

" But why dost utter prophecies, which do too 
much excite men's minds, as is alleged ?" 

" Because I cannot choose," said Tom ; and he 
drew himself up and pointed through the bay-win- 
dow to the broad river, which was brightened by 
the full moon, and added, " I can no more help 
giving utterance to the foreknowledge which comes; 
into my mind in my solitude, and after long fasting 
and prayer, than the waters of that river can avoid 
the influence of the planet which causes the ebb and 
flow of the tide." 

"But," said Sir John, "there have been false 
prophets as well as true ones. Our divines tell us 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 107 

that the voice of prophecy ceased at the coming 
of the Redeemer, which was the fulfilment of all 
prophecy. How, then, canst prove thyself a true 
prophet ?" 

" By the verifications of my predictions," replied 
the hermit. " In the year sixteen hundred and 
sixty- five, I foretold a national judgment, and that 
year came the plague. In sixteen hundred and 
sixty-six, I told men that the vials of the heavenly 
wrath were filled, and that year came the great 
fire ; for this year I have predicted another judg- 
ment, more fearful than fire and plague. And it 
is coming, and is at hand ! Therefore let me call 
ye all to repentance !" 

Sir John, being more and more puzzled, uttered 
some hems and hahs, and then said with some 
simplicity — "If it be as thou sayest — if what 
thou foresayest doth so surely come to pass, then 
man why dost not foretell good things ? Better 
be a prophet of good, than a prophet of evil. Tom, 
I have known thee do kind deeds among our poor 
Kentish folk ; and, it hath been told me, that thou 
hast in thy heart a love of thy country. Then, 
prithee, why not foretell some good thing, instead 
of all this woe?" 

" Worthy knight," said the hermit, " I cannot 
shape my predictions to suit the wish and pleasure 
of the world, as that ungodly impostor Lilly, the 
star-gazer, is said to do. I cannot do as our 
roystering Kentish youths are wont to do at the 
season when the apple-trees are putting on their 
blossoms; and when, with an un- Christianlike 
noise and a very heathenish ceremony, they run 
into the orchards and encircle every tree, and pro- 
mise the farmer, 



108 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

* To every twig, apple big ! 
To every bough, apples enow !' 

and then, if the owner should not give them to 
drink and hand them money besides, they do unsay 
what they have said, and tell the good man, in ano- 
ther rhyme, that his crop of apples will be nought. 
I cannot do this, Sir John. I predict not for gold, 
like the London astrologer ; nor for ale and shil- 
lings, like our young Kentish bumpkins ! I only 
utter the words which are put into my mouth or 
into my heart. I would foretell good things if I 
could. But, sunk in sin as she is, how can England 
expect good ? Again, I say, let us all humble our- 
selves, and repent ! I would die this instant, and 
be happy in my death, if I could but see the begin- 
ning of repentance. This land is overshadowed by 
sin and the devil ! The awful judgment cannot be 
delayed ! Let every man look to the wickedness of 
his own heart, and repent — repent — repent !" 

The people present trembled. Sir John, turn- 
ing to his cousin, said, " Sir Ealph, tell me what to 
say next. Sir Ealph, you must e ? en speak up your- 
self as a deponent, for there is no man here that will 
speak against him." 

" Call up my man Faittout," said Sir Kalph ; 
"he will depone whatsoever you will." 

" But, cousin Ealph, these country folk will not 
understand the varlet's English. They may take 
it into their heads to cry out against him as a French- 
man and a Papist — and what, in Heaven's name, 
can Faittout know about Tom in the Woods?" 

" He can say he knows just this much — that it is 
a common rumour, both in court and city, that 
Tom's outcryings against the wickedness of the 
times are directed against the King's sacred ma- 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 109 

jesty, and that Tom's prophesyings excite to riot 
and insurrection, and are the main cause of the 
mutiny of our sailors." 

Poor Sir John rubbed his chin, said that was the 
point where he ought to have begun, and sent to 
call up Faittout. 

When the Frenchman came into the room, and 
caught, for the first time in his life, a sight of Tom 
of the Woods, as Tom was standing near the bay- 
window, he started back as if he had seen a ghost. 
He had been familiar in his own country with the 
sight of bearded men, and with men gashed and 
scarred in the wars ; but such a beard, such scars 
as Tom's, he had never seen. When his master told 
him, in French, the service that was expected from 
him, although he was no coward, he almost shook, 
and he tried to excuse himself. He could not, 
however, deny that he had heard the rumour, as 
well in the city as in the precincts of the court, and 
at last he undertook to give a deposition to that 
effect, provided his master would speak first in the 
same sense. 

Upon this, Sir Ralph, finding that he could not 
do otherwise, made a deposition, and then Faittout 
followed him and repeated his very words, as nearly 
as he could remember and pronounce them. Sir 
John did not take the oaths of the deponents, for 
he would have thought his justice Bible profaned 
by being put to the lips of a Papist like Faittout ; 
but he wrote down what was said, and then asked 
Tom of the Woods whether he had any reply to 
make. Tom answered that he had none, except 
that in his prophesyings he had never named the 
King, or any other person ; that he had never meant 
to excite men to insurrection, and that he knew the 

f 3 



THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

In the fleet was not caused by him. With 
ig and most unwilling hand Sir John drew 
rder to the constable to keep the prophet a 
in his house (for the only prison in Erith 
rong room by the side of Mike's shaving- 
until he could be removed to the county 
f He clearly foresaw what would happen, and he 
scarcely grieve at it. Come what might, he 
ione all that the King could reasonably expect 
him. To have done what the wise court 
d would have required an armed force. 
The prophet, taking great pains to keep the 
5ople quiet, walked down to Mike's lock-up, and 
filtered therein, for this was in his vision ; but when, 
ess than an hour, the men, women, and children 
ith were joined by a mob which had collected 
the neighbouring villages and hamlets, and 
Tame and broke open the prison door, Tom girded 
his cloak about him and walked out a free man, for 
this, too, was in his vision, and by so speedily 
regaining his liberty he was only completing his 
own prophecy. 

Among the crowd which escorted Tom up the 
hills were several persons of superior condition. Of 
these some had taken part in this breach of the law 
out of superstition and fanaticism, and with the 
undoubting belief that poor Tom was really an 
inspired personage ; but others had interfered simply 
from motives of humanity, having been led to sus- 
pect that the government would wreak a cruel ven- 
geance upon poor Tom if they could get him and 
keep him in their power. Among the latter class 
was Walter Wynton, who had mounted his horse 
and ridden over to Erith from his father's house 
at the first news of the hermit's arrest, which had 






TOM OF THE WOODS. Ill 

been spread far and wide with amazing rapidity ; 
for Tom had his friends and devotees in all direc- 
tions (and the number and activity of these people, 
and the daily and almost hourly visits paid by some 
or other of them to their prophet, were the real 
causes of a good part of his seemingly mysterious 
information). Though he had left his horse out- 
side the village and had muffled himself in his 
cloak, Walter was too well known to escape being 
recognised ; and it was soon gossiped about that 
master Walter had been the first to break into the 
lock-up room. This was said in commendation, 
and for honour ; but it was afterwards heard by 
some who employed it to discredit and ruin young- 
Wynton. 

Sir John was sitting at supper with his guest 
and the ladies, when the mob halted opposite to his 
house and gave him notice, with three cheers, that 
Tom of the Woods was free, and was going to put 
himself beyond the reach of warrants. " Let there 
be no more of this," shouted one of the mob ; " let 
the courtiers of London leave the prophet in Kent 
to himself, or perchance we may do that in the 
great city which will make them think that Wat 
the Tyler and John Ball the priest, with the old 
commons of Kent, be upon them ! We Kentish 
men have in all times given sharp blows for our 
friends, and our old rights and privileges !" It 
required all the respect they entertained for the 
worthy knight, and all the convincing eloquence 
of poor Tom, to prevent their hooting and me- 
nacing Sir Ralph, who, at this moment, looked 
amazingly silly and disconcerted. Taking a cup 
of claret in his hand, as soon as the mob was gone 
away, he said, " May this good drink be my poison 



112 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

if ever I volunteer to go a prophet-hunting again ! 
But 'tis no fault of mine ! They ought to have 
sent me with a squadron of his Majesty's guards, 
and then " 

" And then," said Sir John, " there would have 
been bleeding noses and no gain. The people 
would have fought for Tom ; the sailors in the 
river, and from Deptford, and Woolwich, and 
Gravesend, would have gathered here, and bad 
would have been made worse ! And you could 
never have succeeded in unearthing Tom ; and 
even if you had caught him, and overcome all 
resistance here, you could never have carried him 
away ; for if you had tried to go by water, the 
sailors would have been upon you, and if you had 
endeavoured to go by land, every Kentish man 
between this and Greenwich would have risen 
against you. 'Tis a pitiful business, and were 
better not done ; but it is better as it is than as it 
might have been." 

" Of a certainty," said Sir Ralph, " I shall 
come to no honour or preferment by this expedition ; 
but there is good hope that the King and court 
will by this time have forgotten that they ever 
sent me." 

u Then cousin Ealph let us try and forget it as 
quickly as we can, and in the meanwhile say no 
more about it. The times are too unsettled, and 
there are too many storms gathering around us, to 
think of calling the good Erith people to account 
for what they have done this night. Cousin Ralph, 
fill to the King's majesty's health, and then sing 
us a good cavalier song. May God send his Ma- 
jesty better days and better advisers !" 

Sir Ralph gladly accepted both invitations, and 



TOM OF THE WOODS. 113 

although his singing had been somewhat spoiled 
by his hard drinking, he sang with very good 
emphasis " When the King enjoys his own again." 
Before he could begin " Phillida flouts me/' Marion 
withdrew. My lady tarried, and would have tarried 
still, but Sir John gave her a peremptory warning, 
seeing that his cousin was getting very mellow, 
and exceedingly free both in his speech and in his 
songs. Since Sir Ealph's last visit there had been 
no such late sitting at Erith. At last the two 
cousins drank the St. George and separated. 



( 1H ) 



CHAPTER VI. 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 



Sir John Roundtree woke the next morning with 
a headache, and very heartily sick of his guest. 

" If this graceless cousin of mine tarries much 
longer," said Sir John, " he will talk her ladyship, 
my wife, quite crazy, and frighten poor Marion 
out of her wits. I wish he were gone — I wish he 
had never come — but he is my kinsman, I must 
not be inhospitable — What shall I do ?" Our good 
knight did nothing at all ; and as Sir Ralph found 
it botli expedient and pleasant to stay where he 
was, he determined to stay for a few days. If he 
should go back to court while the business was 
fresh, he might get laughed at for catching a wild 
man of the woods only to let him go again. Nor 
did the journey back to London tempt him as a 
pleasant and safe one just at this moment. In the 
course of the night the sailors of another king's 
ship, lying in the upper part of the Hope, near 
Gravesend, had mutinied, and after landing their 
officers in the pinnace, they had run out their guns, 
shotted and ready for action : the whole river, 
from the Tower down to the buoy at the Nore, 
was reported to be in a most disorderly state, the 
crews of the merchant-ships which could not put to 
sea for fear of being captured by the Dutch, hav- 
ing taken up the cause of the sailors of the fleet as 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 115 

their own. And if there was danger in going back 
by the river, there was also a chance of it if he 
went by land ; for the country people might lay in 
wait for him on the road — and who could tell 
whither that devil Tom of the Woods had betaken 
himself? In the course of the morning much 
news and gossip was brought to the mansion. If 
half of it were true, the Kentish men on shore were 
almost as mutinous as the sailors. Sir John was 
considerably distressed, and Lady Roundtree pro- 
portionately gladdened, by hearing the very bold 
and active part which Walter Wynton had taken 
in battering and breaking open the door of Mike's 
lock-up house. 

" And who is this Walter Wynton ?" said Sir 
Ralph, who had never seen him. 

Marion, who was present, turned aside her head 
in a very fruitless attempt to conceal a blush. 
Lady Roundtree, by silent telegraph, gave Sir 
Ralph to understand that she would tell him some- 
thing as soon as she could speak with him alone ; 
and Sir John, who found it very inconvenient to 
enter into any explanation, said, " Oh ! master 
Walter is a very brave young gentleman, who at 
times lacks discretion — but a brave young gentle- 
man always is master Walter. He is the bravest 
horseman, the best fowler and angler in all these 
parts — he knoweth Izaak Walton's book by heart — 
and is ofttimes here, and the sharer of my sports. 
The last jack we did kill in the Cray weighed 
eighteen pounds." 

" But did you not say Wynton — Walter Wyn- 
ton ?" asked Sir Ralph. 

Lady Roundtree, answering for her silent hus- 
band, said, " Ay, that is the youth's name." 






116 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

" The only Wynton I ever heard of at court," 
said Sir Ralph, " was that pestilent Roundhead, 
Captain Wynton of the fleet, who gave the King 
so much trouble. Can it be that this master Wal- 
ter is that rebel's son ? — But, cousin, you speak of 
the youth as your friend and frequent inmate. It 
cannot be ! Sir John Roundtree would not admit 
the son of such a Roundhead within his doors." 

Gentle as she was, Marion's dark blue eyes 
flashed fire at these words, and she looked at Sir 
Ralph as if she could drive him out of those doors. 
That look and the preceding blush were quite 
enough to tell a story. Sir Ralph no longer stood 
in any need of one part of her ladyship's intended 
explanations. In the meanwhile Sir John was~ 
reddening all over, dreading to appear inconsistent 
and untrue to his principles, though only in the 
eyes of a man like his cousin, and yet hating to 
deny the truth, or even to seem shy of confessing 
it. At last his perplexity gave way to a good 
hearty fit of passion, directed wholly against his 
cousin — 

" Cousin Ralph," said Sir John, " it is not for 
you to tell me against whom I am to shut my 
doors. But for one honest man of the late faction, 
I should have had no door to shut or open. Wal- 
ter Wynton is the son of the bosom friend of that 
Cromwellite, and, as I said before, he is a brave 
young gentleman. With the father I have never 
associated. But, s'blood, why should I give such 
explanations to you ! If you like not the company 
that come to this house, you can get ye back to 
court and choose your own. You come here un- 
bidden, and you bring a pack of troubles with 
you !" Our knight must have been wroth indeed 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 117 

ere he could commit this breach of hospitality. 
Her ladyship, who had never heard him say so 
plainly to any man, and much less to a cavalier 
and cousin-german — " Get out of my house," was 
all amazement. But, as it did not suit Sir Ralph 
to quarrel, and as he could in no case get him 
gone without borrowing again from his cousin, he 
would not take the affront, but began a long con- 
ciliatory speech, which Sir John did not stop to 
hear the end of. Beckoning Marion to follow 
him, the old knight went into the garden, and there 
walked up and down with such long and hasty 
strides that his ward could scarcely keep pace with 
him. His anger, however, soon cooled, and then 
he felt heartily ashamed of the few hasty words he 
had said. He returned into the house, made a very 
unnecessary apology, and invited his cousin to join 
him and his ward in their garden walk. But in 
the meanwhile Lady Roundtree had fully ac- 
quainted Sir Ralph with the whole history of Wal- 
ter Wynton ; and Sir Ralph had vowed that he 
would get the said master Walter into such trouble 
as would make it impossible for him ever to be 
Marion's husband. The courtier had also amused 
her ladyship's imagination with various little fic- 
tions, some having relation to herself, and others 
to a great lord at court, who was entirety guided 
by his advice, and would soon make mistress Ma- 
rion forget that there ever had been such a person 
in the world as master Walter. 

For poor Marion this was a wearisome day, and 
so was the day which followed it. Walter Wyn- 
ton neither came nor sent ; and the odious Sir 
Ralph, whenever he found an opportunity, would 
be talking rhapsodies to her. But it was not until 



118 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

the morning of the third day that her cup of dis- 
gust was filled to overflowing. 

By means of the ingenious Faittout, Sir Ealph 
discovered that the young lady was a very early 
riser, and accustomed to be in her flower-garden an 
hour or twain before Sir John and my lady were 
stirring. As he sate so late at night, to the no small 
derangement of that quiet family, and as he had 
hitherto come down so very late in the morning, 
Marion hardly expected to be disturbed in her 
early occupation. This morning, however, as if she 
had had her visions as well as Tom of the Woods, 
she roused her hand-maiden, and made her accom- 
pany her to the garden. Marion was busy among 
her flowers, and looking as lovely as Perdita, and 
Lucy, her maid, who had but small skill in flori- 
culture, was sitting in an alcove knitting, when 
approaching steps were heard along the winding 
gravel path. Marion thought it could only be the 
old gardener, and did not look up. Lucy remained 
in the alcove, concealed by a screen of flowering* 
honeysuckle. The sound of the steps came nearer y 
but still Marion did not turn her attention from 
the flowers she was tying. But, hark ! somebody 
sings ! that is not Hodge the gardener ! Marion 
then looked up for the first time, and saw, at the 
distance of only a few paces, our dissolute cavalier, 
who had not slept long enough to be quite sober, 
and who approached her, singing — 

" I often heard her say, 

That she loved posies ; 
In the last month of May 

I gave her roses ; 
Cowslips and gilly-flowers, 

And the sweet lily, 
I got to deck the bowers 

Of my dear Philly." 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 119 

" Sir Ralph !" said Marion, " there is no place 
here for you at this hour. What brings you 
hither?" 

" Love/' said Sir Ralph. " Nothing but love !" 
And, having a singing in his head, he went on — 

" 'T was drink made me fall into love, 

And love made me run into debt, 
And though I have struggled and struggled and strove, 

I cannot get out of them yet. 
There 's nothing but money can cure me, 

And rid me of all my pain." 

" Sir Ralph/' said Marion, " I wish you would rid 
me of your company. I have told you before now 
how displeasing this behaviour is to me, and how 
much unbecoming your years." 

" Years, forsooth! Who talks of years? I am 
no older than the King's religious majesty, and 
that is the fashionable age at court, whatever it 
may be in Kent ! Ventre saint gris ! Why, what 
age dost thou take me for, thou pouting mistress 
Marion ?'' 

" The King's years be thirty-seven — a staid age 
with most men — but I have heard my good guar- 
dian say that his cousin Sir Ralph Spicer is forty- 
five years old." 

" My cousin Round tree has a wooden head and 
no memory ! I tell thee, mistress Marion, that we 
are all gay young men at court — that I am young, 
and will be young and thoughtless for twenty good 
years to come, and that thou oughtest to quit these 
Kentish clodpoles, and with me to Whitehall, to 
see how we gallants live, and to learn what life 
is." 

Here Marion gave him a look which ought to 
have checked his confidence and humbled his 



120 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

vanity ; but the fumes of the overnight's claret 
swam in his head, and as the young lady said 
" Since you will not leave me, Sir Ralph, I must 
leave you," he caught her by the wrist and vowed 
that she should not go quite so soon. Some of 
that spirit which had often animated Captain 
Hemingford on his quarter-deck now flashed from 
his daughter. "This is insult, Sir Ealph, ,, said 
she ; " this is base surprise, and unmanly violence ! 
Unhand me, Sir ! I say unhand me, and leave me, 
or let me leave this place !" 

It is doubtful whether the half-inebriated pro- 
fligate would have let go his hold of that beautiful 
young arm so soon, if Lucy had not come forth 
from the arbour with a scream, and with something 
which was better than a scream, a good heavy 
garden-rake, with which she threatened the visage 
of the court rake. Sir Ralph, who had no notion 
that Marion had brought her attendant with her, 
did certainly look rather discomposed at this junc- 
ture ; but he soon found his impudence and his 
tongue. " Mistress Marion," said he, " these are 
but rustical manners, only to be excused by thy 
ignorance and exceeding simplicity. Child, I did 
thee too much honour in paying thee a few courtly 
compliments. But dost think that Sir Ralph 
Spicer, who is run after by half the ladies at St. 
James's — to say nothing of rich wives, widows, and 
maidens in the city — will ever really trouble his 
head about a Kentish lass that meets him with 
pshaws and shall nots ?" And having thus said, 
to set himself still better at his ease, the cavalier 
sang— 

L " J'aime bien quand je suis aime, 
Mais je ne puis etre enflamme 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 121 



Des belles qui sont inhumaines. 



Et si Ton veut me posseder 

II faut de charmes pour me prendre, 

Et des faveurs pour me garder." 

Sir Ralph was obliged to walk while he was sing- 
ing, for Marion, with her maid Lucy (who had not 
quitted her garden-rake), was taking the shortest 
way to the house. 

" One word," said Sir Ralph, " one word mis- 
tress Marion, before we part." 

" Sir," said the daughter of Hemingford, u there 
have been words enough, and too many — there has 
been misusage and unmannerliness, and too much 
of that. I would not make discord between kins- 
men .... I would not stir up strife between any 
men .... but, were I to tell Sir John Roundtree 
of your behaviour in this garden, my father's 
friend and my own best friend would make you feel 
his displeasure." 

" And were I," rejoined the cavalier, growing 
spiteful, " were I to tell my dull cousin that this 
shy bird, his ward, gets out of her cage at un- 
seemly hours to meet her Roundhead spark in this 
garden .... why, then, my cousin Sir John would 
see to it. Mistress Marion, thine anger is in good 
part matter of disappointment ! Thou wast here 
to meet that puritanical stripling they call master 
Walter — the son of that malignant Captain Wyn- 
ton. The crop-eared father narrowly escaped 
hanging at Tyburn for the traitor that he is. 
Mayhap the son will not be quite so fortunate. 
It is no light matter to break open the doors of a 
prison — it is no light matter to do what Walter 
Wynton did the other night — and then his name 



122 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

alone is enough to hang him ; and men have been 
drawn, hanged, and quartered for less offences . . . 
So, so, Mistress Marion, thou turnest pale, dost 
thou ? Thou tremblest ? Thy knees may tremble 
more when thou comest to the matted gallery in 
Whitehall, to kneel, to pray for . . . * 

" If master Walter were here," said the maiden 
Lucy, who was excited to that degree that she 
could put no control upon her tongue, " if master 
Walter were but here, he would cut your big ugly 
periwig in twain for making my sweet mistress be 
so pale. The most that men do say of master 
Walter is that he kicked open the door of the 
barber's shop, and most do say that he did not so 
much as that, and that he was at home at Charlton 
nursing his sick father when Tom of the Woods 
was released by Providence according to his 
prophecy." 

But before the warm-hearted Kentish hand- 
maiden had quite finished her short speech, Sir 
Ralph had kissed his hand in a mocking, insolent 
manner, to her fair and now certainly very pale 
mistress ; had taken his departure, and was on his 
way to his bed to get that additional sleep which 
his head certainly needed : and he soon disappeared 
within the house, singing from his friend Sir John 
Denham, 

" I pretend not to the wise ones, 
To the grave, 
Or the precise ones." 

On the morning following these garden-scenes, 
a certain dapper young man riding a promising 
nag arrived at Sir John Roundtree's from the 
village of Charlton. It was only Joe Whitehead, 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 123 

the groom or horse-boy of master "Walter ; yet his 
coming was as welcome to two inmates of the 
house at Erith as it could have been if he had been 
King Joseph, or Joseph an Emperor. He brought 
a letter to Sir John Roundtree, in which his young 
master frankly stated that he had indeed been 
present at, and taken part in, the breaking open of 
Mike Woodenspoon's lock-up ; but in which he 
also reminded Sir John that Tom of the Woods 
had not been committed in a very legal or regular 
manner, and that the detention of the poor prophet 
with the chances of his being subjected to barbarous 
treatment, was neither what he the knight could 
wish, nor what the people of the country would 
allow without a great tumult. Walter further told 
the knight that he would have been to Erith to 
give fuller explanation by word of mouth, but for a 
sudden indisposition of his father. 

Of this last circumstance, as we have seen, the 
maiden Lucy had shown some knowledge. She 
had an interest in knowing what passed at Charlton; 
and as that village is little more than five miles 
from Erith, and as gossips daily went and came 
between the two places, she might have obtained 
the information without the aid of a fairy or the 
relations of a seer. 

As Sir John read master Wynton's letter, he 
muttered to himself- — " Break open a prison, that 
is very bad ! but to confess it under his own hand, 
whatever the future danger may be, that is very 
good — or very unlike a Puritan ! I should not 
have liked to hear of the poor lunatic's ears being 
cut off, or of his being sent to the plantations. 
But I do verily believe the Kentish blood would 
have been up and mischief done before Tom of the 



124 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

Woods could have been gotten from Erith. 
master Walter hath done a better service in helping 
to let Tom go. than my mad cousin did me in 
making me commit poor Tom. I say again, I am 
glad Tom of the Woods is gone free. And I wish 
Sir Ealph would get him back to Whitehall." 

Joe Whitehead was the bearer of another letter 
which he delivered to Lucy — though it was not in- 
tended for Lucy's reading. Marion, who had 
heard, even in her quiet solitude, of the mad and 
bloody duels that were continually taking place in 
London about the court, and who had a fearful 
conception of the ferocity of many of the cavalier 
party, or of the reckless desperate men who claimed 
to be the choice spirits of the age (and she had 
quite recently heard of friend killing friend, and 
even brother brother in savage duels, and upon 
slight provocations), had not only determined to 
keep Sir Ralph's insolence to herself, but had also 
charged her handmaiden not to mention it to any- 
body, lest it should come to the ears of master 
Walter. Poor Lucy had given a promise, with 
the full intention of keeping it : but Joe loved 
Lucy and Lucy him, and for a long time past there 
had been no secrets between them. And then, 
that outlandish man Faittout and the pestilent 
monkey had so flustered and tormented Lucy, the 
one by making love to her, and the other by 
making faces at her, and by playing all manner of 
antics and foul tricks in the servants' hall, that her 
heart was too full to allow her to be silent about 
the visitors in the house ; and when she began talk- 
ing and revealing with Joe in the pantry, while 
he was refreshing himself with the never-failing 
cup of ale, she revealed much more than she meant 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 125 

to do, and never found out her mistake until Joe 
jumped up in a round passion and swore he would 
cut the monkey's throat first, and beat the French- 
man within an inch of his life afterwards, and go 
and bring down master Walter to deal with the 
cavaliero. Then Lucy wept and implored Joe to 
be quiet if he really loved her, and told him how 
strictly her young mistress had enjoined her to be 
silent and secret — at least about all that scene in 
the garden. Now, as Joe Whitehead was really 
and truly head over ears in love, his wrath was 
soon subdued, and he was easily made to promise 
that he would say nothing to his young master for 
fear of combustion and trouble. We think that 
before Joe left the house at Erith there was a neat 
little letter put into his hand with the name of 
master Walter Wynton upon it ; but we know for 
historical truths, that after giving a kick to the 
monkey who was chained up in the servants' hall, 
and a very unfriendly look to Monsieur Faittout, 
who was brushing his master's cloak in the yard, 
Joe Whitehead mounted his nag and trotted away 
over hill, heath, and common for Charlton, his 
heart being lighter than it otherwise would have 
been, by the assurance he had received from Lucy 
that both master and man, Sir Ealph and Faittout 
— were going to leave for London that same fore- 
noon. 

Now, it so fell out that the visitors at Erith did 
not take their departure until the noon of the fol- 
lowing day, although Sir Ealph had settled all the 
necessary preliminaries, and had intended to take 
his departure at the time mentioned by Marion's 
maiden. He had borrowed from his cousin some 
gold pieces, which the knight cared little enough 

G 



126 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

about, and he had even succeeded in borrowing the 
knight's favourite bright bay mare, which Sir 
John cared a great deal about, and the lending of 
which showed how eager he was to get rid of his 
kinsman, who would not venture by water on ac- 
count of the mutinous sailors. But when all these 
arrangements were made, our cavalier thought it 
would be better to tarry another day where he was, 
to allow more time for the people to cool upon the 
subject of the arrest of Tom of the Woods, and for 
xhe courtiers at Whitehall to forget the business 
he had been sent upon. In spite of the side-looks 
and frowns of her husband, Lady Koundtree 
earnestly pressed him to stay and enliven their 
dullness with a little more lively talk ; and Sir 
Ealph had the art of making it appear — at least to 
her ladyship — that he stayed the one day more only 
to please her, and at the cost of much pleasure at 
court and some detriment to state business. 

On the morrow, however, a little before the hour 
of noon, Sir Ealph Spicer took his departure from 
the house at Erith, well mounted on Sir John's bay 
mare, and being followed by Faittout, who be- 
strode a little rough pony hired for that occasion. 
The beautiful weather still continued : the bright 
warm sun of June shone out from a blue sky which 
had scarcely a cloud ; the air w r as balmy, and per- 
fumed with the sweetbriar and eglantine, with the 
unseen violet which grew in shade near the edges 
of the woods and coppices, or on the moist banks 
by the roadside ; and myriads of birds were singing 
in those Kentish woodlands. Although scarcely 
conscious of these purer influences, they neverthe- 
less acted upon his dulled and vitiated spirit, and 
contributed greatly to Sir Balph's buoyancy of 



, 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT, 127 

heart. As he rode along he felt gayer than he had 
done for many a long day. Perhaps he thought 
that this was all owing to the gold he had gotten 
into his purse, for before he got out of sight of 
Erith church he began to sing — 

" Money ? s a lady ; nay, she is a princess ; 
Nay more, a goddess adored on earth. 
Without this money who can be merry, 
Though he be never so noble by birth ? 



When thou hast Money, then friends thou hast many ; 

When it is wasted, their friendship is cold ; 
Go by Geronimo, no man then will thee know, 

Knowing thou hast neither silver nor gold. 



Money doth all things, both great things and small 
* t things ; 

Money doth all things, as plainly we see : 
Money doth each thing, want can do nothing, 

Poverty parteth still good companie : 
When thou hast spent all, or else hast lent all, 

Who then is loving or kind unto thee f* 

Thus carolling and ambling 1 the cavalier and his 
man came to Lessness Heath, where the road was 
scarcely perceptible, or where there was then no 
high road, every traveller choosing his own path 
over the green sward, and among the furze and 
thickly-growing brushwood. Our travellers were 
somewhat embarrassed in their choice, for they 
knew not the country, and in that solitude they 
could see no cottage, and met with no one of 
whom to ask the way. Sir Ralph, however, with- 
out taking the shortest path, chose pretty well, and, 
crossing Lessness Heath, and leaving the old grey 
tower of East Wickham church on the left, he 
soon got upon Plumstead Common. Here the 
scenerv became still wilder, the ground rougher 

g 2 



128 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

and more broken, the furze thicker and higher ; and 
there was more wood and coppice. But there was 
beauty and sweetness in this increasing wildness. 
The furze was covered with its rich golden bloom, 
and the wild thyme, that grew all about, mixed 
its perfume with that of the blooming heather, and 
gave out its full fragrance when crushed beneath 
the hoofs of the two steeds. As they came to the 
very wildest part of Plumstead Common, our tra- 
vellers — who had seen no human being since they 
left Erith, except an old woman in a red cloak, 
attending some very white geese on the common, 
and some little boys hunting for linnets' nests 
among the furze — discovered a gentleman riding 
alone across a lower part of the common. 

" I wonder," said Sir Ralph, " who is that soli- 
tary spark?" 

He was soon to know, and to his cost. As he 
was looking at the distant stranger, that gentle- 
man, seeming for the first time to have caught 
sight of him, turned his horse's head, and, quitting 
the path he had been following, rode up the com- 
mon towards our cavaliero. At first he came up 
gently and hesitatingly, as if he doubted whether 
he were not mistaken ; but, as he got within nearer 
view, he spurred his horse, and came on at speed, 
in spite of the rough and broken nature of the 
ground. The bold rider was Walter Wynton, 
who had been pursuing the shortest road from 
Charlton to Erith, with various unpleasant thoughts 
working in his head. Poor Marion's well-intended 
secret — for it was intended to prevent strife and 
bloodshed — had been a second time betrayed. Joe 
Whitehead—- ^con eluding that Sir Ralph must have 
been before this back in the great city, whither 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 129 

his young master most rarely went, and whither 
he could not consider him mad enough to go in 
search of a courtier — thought that there would be 
no great harm in telling what Lucy had told him 
yesterday ; and, as Walter was preparing for his 
ride, his groom had told him all about the scene 
in the garden, and the exceeding vexation which 
the roystering cavalier had caused mistress Ma- 
rion. Although he had some notion of going to 
London with a friend, Walter had not the least 
expectation of meeting our courtly knight on 
Plumstead Common ; but, as such personages were 
not often seen in that lone place, it struck him, as 
soon as he saw the cavalier's gay dress, that this 
could be no other than Sir Ralph ; and, when he 
got near enough to see the well-known bay mare 
he was riding, he could have sworn to his man, 
although he had never seen him before. 

Walter did not draw rein until he drew up 
across a rugged narrow path which our knight 
w r as following ; and then, rising in his stirrups, he 
said, in a tone very unlike that used in friendly 
greetings, " Sir Ralph Spicer, if I mistake not ?" 

" Who is it that asks ?" said the cavalier. 

" Walter Wynton," replied the young man ; 
"and that name is enough to tell you that you 
must dismount and fight me here." 

The cavalier eyed his man, and the length of 
the sword he wore at his side. The sight was not 
such as to give the assurance of an easy victory ; 
and Sir Ralph, whose courage and nerve had been 
injured by drink and debauchery, would rather not 
have fought at all in that lonely place. But he 
bethought him that Walter had only been a tar- 
paulin, that sailors were seldom skilled in fence, 



130 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

and that he in his exile had learned the trick from 
some of the best French masters. Moreover, he 
saw that he must either fight or run away, and that 
there was but slight chance of escaping on that 
rough country from one that was so well mounted, 
and rode so fearlessly. During the few seconds 
that these calculations were made in the mind of 
the cavalier, the young sailor loosened his sword 
from its sheath, and half drew it ; and Faittout 
expressed by sundry French ejaculations that he 
expected his master w r ould dismount, and drill a 
hole through the young man's jerkin. Having 
made up his mind, Sir Ralph said, " Roundhead 
and malignant, I use not to fight in duello with 
such as thou art, but to leave them to the pillory 
and gibbet. Thou hast done that at Erith which 
may lay thee by the heels before long, if I spare 
thee now. But, since thou wilt have it so, I will 
even dismount, and change the colour of some of 
these heath-flowers with thy blood." 

He dismounted and drew, but not before Walter 
Wynton was out of the saddle and on the ground, 
with his good rapier unsheathed. Faittout got off 
the pony to hold the two steeds, and to look upon 
the fight with a critical eye, but with the very 
confident assurance that his well-taught master, 
who had lived so long in France, must, after a 
very few passes, run his adversary through the 
body. But, when swords were crossed, the fenc- 
ing French valet began to waver in his opinion, 
for Walter handled his weapon like one who had 
been tolerably well taught ; and in vigour of limb, 
in breath, and in quickness of eye he clearly had 
the superiority. The roughness of the ground was 
more unfavourable to Sir Ralph, who skipped 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 131 

about in the manner of the French school, than to 
Walter, who stood firm, with one foot fixed on the 
heath, in the manner of the Spanish, or rather 
Neapolitan school of fence. After a few lounges 
the cavalier missed his footing, and fell among the 
furze. His life was at the mercy of his adversary, 
but Walter would not take advantage of an acci- 
dent. When Sir Ralph rose he fought much more 
cautiously, and Faittout had soon the satisfaction 
to call out in French " Blood ! blood ! Cavalier 
you have drawn the first blood, and had you not 
better let this decide, and end the combat, as our 
rule is in France?" 

Sir Ralph instantly acted upon the suggestion — 
" Young man thou art wounded, shall we stop 
here?" 

"Fight on, " replied Walter ; "I am no duel- 
seeker, and fight not for trifles ; but when I do 
draw the sword it is not a scratch, that shall make 
me put it into the scabbard. You have insulted 
my honourable father — you have done other wrongs 
which can hardly be expiated with your blood ; but 
you or I shall fall here." 

The fight continued ; and Walter — fresh in 
strength as when he began, and altogether insen- 
sible to the slight wound which he had received — 
plied his rapier so vigorously, that Sir Ralph lost 
breath and gave ground, and in so doing received 
the point of his adversary's sword on one of his 
ribs, and nearly measured his length backwards. 
At this sight, which seemed to threaten him with 
the loss of his place, Faittout threw up the reins 
of the steeds he was holding, and, drawing his 
own sword, threw himself between his master and 
Walter, and, as he beat aside Walter's sword, Sir 



132 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

Ralph made a very ungenerous and unmanly thrust 
at his brave foe. But, before any more mischief 
could be done, a tall, gaunt man, with a beard 
flowing down to his girdle, came out of some un- 
derwood close at hand, shouting " What is this 
ungodly brawl ? Know ye not that the judgment 
of the Lord is at hand ? Put up your swords, I 
say. But what ! have we two upon one ?" 

It was Tom of the Woods, with a tremendous 
oaken staff in his hand ; and that staff was presently 
applied to the pate of Faittout with so much vigour 
that the varlet bit the heath. Then, standing by 
the side of the cavalier and Walter Wynton, who 
renewed their fight, Tom said, — " Master Walter, 
I thought not to find you engaged in such work as 
this ; but I know you enough to know that you 
must have strong and good cause for it — and as 
you have now a fair field, go on in God's name, 
and smite that Philistine. But coolly, master 
Walter, forget not your fence, my young master ! 
So, so, ply him so ! — that's a good thrust — that 
lounge was well parried ! . . Straight home ! . . . 
Ah, Ha ! — you hit him there, you hit him ! " 

The old-soldier fighting part of Tom's cha- 
racter had completely gotten the better of the 
prophet and caller to repentance. He was fol- 
lowing the combatants with his staff held up in the 
air like a truncheon, when Faittout, having re- 
covered from the stunning effects of his blow, and 
in part from the awe his so sudden appearance 
created in him, put himself upon his track with his 
drawn sword. Tom, however, was too old a soldier 
to be taken by surprise : absorbed as he was by 
watching master Walter's prowess and good fence, 
lie yet kept the corner of an eye for the French- 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 133 

man, and as soon as Fait tout came within reach he 
loweied his oaken staff, knocked the sword out of 
the varlet's hand, by hitting him a fearful rap 
across the knuckles, and then knocked the senses 
fairly out of his head by another and a harder 
stroke across the pate. Meanwhile Sir Ralph had 
kept receding* and retreating until he found him- 
self at the edge of a precipice overhanging a sand 
and gravel pit. As he could retreat no farther, the 
cavalier, whose breath and strength were all but 
gone, made one desperate effort to recover ground 
in front ; but in the act he fell bodily upon the 
point of Walter's sword, and then, reeling back- 
ward from the weapon, fell over the precipice into 
the deep pit, with one short groan. 

" He is gone to his account ! " said Tom of the 
Woods. " But now, master Walter, ye must get 
ye to some place of safety, for the fairness of this 
duello on your part will not save you from trouble 
if you should be caught, and that French variety 
who will soon come to his senses again, may make 
false report, and the word of Tom of the Woods 
will not be taken in these unfair times.*' 

Walter now, for the first time, thought of his 
horse, and looked across Plumstead Common for 
him. Upon Faittout giving up the reins, in order 
to cover his master, Sir John Roundtree's bay 
mare, after a shake or two of the head, had cantered 
off for her stable at Erith, and Walter's good black 
horse had scampered after her, and even the sluggish 
little pony had shown its heels in the air and had 
gone off in the same direction. 

" I must walk back to Charlton and see my 
poor old father," said Walter. 

" Not so/' said Tom ; " I will find the means of 

g 3 



134 THE DUTCH IN THE MIDWAY. 

breaking this business to Captain Wynton, and . . 
. . . also to the gentle mistress Marion at Erith, 
lest she should think worse hath happened than 
the death of that foul scoffer. But you must away, 
Master Walter — away instantly to some safe hiding- 
place ! " 

" But whither shall I go? " said Walter. 

" If you could live in the woods like a hermit," 
said Tom, " I would say come with me into the 
Weald ; if you could dwell in caves and holes in 
the earth, as I have done when the unrighteous 
were seeking to ensnare me, I would say follow me 
to the chalk caverns by Cray ford, where there be 
chambers, and passages, and labyrinths that defy 
search ; but as you have not been so rudely nur- 
tured as I, and as these lone places would be all 
too drear without the visitations of prophecy, I 
say, master Walter, get ye gone to the great city, 
and seek shelter for a season in the most peopled 
part of it, where you are most likely to escape 
detection." 

" I have no friends in those parts," said Walter, 
musing. " Samuel Pepys, who abides by the 
Navy-office, and whom I have now and then seen 
of late years at Deptford and at Erith, was once 
the friend or most devoted servant of my father ; 
but times are changed, and Pepys is changed with 
them." 

" Aye," said Tom, " in the old Protector's time 
Samuel Pepys was the roundest of Roundheads. I 
would not trust Samuel Pepys ; but I can put you 
in possession of a secret which is the dread of his 
life, and with which you can make him fear you. 
That morning the man Charles Stuart went to the 
block in front of Whitehall, Pepys proposed as 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. I 35 

a fitting text for his funeral sermon — c Let the 
memory of the wicked perish.' He was little more 
than a boy when he said the words ; bat he knows 
that men have been severely handled for less things 
said or done in their boyhood, and next to getting 
money and fine clothes, the great aim of his life is 
to conceal that his father was a tailor of very 
republican principles, and that he, Samuel, was 
ever other than a hot cavalier and high church- 
man. Samuel Pepys, though a backslider and 
turncoat, is not so bad as most of them. There 
is kindness and even a sense of justice in his heart 
— all the seamen do say that he knows his present 
trade, and would put excellent order in the Navy 
if his superiors in office allowed him so to do — 
Pepys might be a very good man yet, if it were 
not for his self-seeking. But then Pepys is a down- 
right coward, and, master Walter, you know a 
coward is never to be trusted." 

Walter, still musing, said, — " I have heard all 
this of Samuel Pepys, yet have I never been able 
to help liking the man the few times that I have 
been in his company ; and, if I cannot trust him, I 
know nobody to whom I can apply for a hiding- 
place." 

" But I do know," said Tom of the Woods. 
" Not many stone-casts from Samuel Pepys's abode 
there dwells my fast friend Hiram Bingley, my 
comrade in the arms of the flesh and my brother in 
the Lord. Hiram has a snng house in Gravel 
Lane, by Ratcliffe Highway : many are the children 
of sorrow and persecution he has sheltered ere now, 
and assuredly he will do his best for the son of so 
true a man as Captain Wynton, and for the friend 
and liberator of poor Tom of the Woods. His 



136 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

vicinage too is full of bold sailors who would all 
fight for a Wynton. But it will not need, for 
Hiram can protect you of himself." 

" But how shall I find this Hiram Bingley, or 
how make him put trust in me ? for I know him 
not, nor does he know me." 

" You will proceed in this wise, master Walter. 
At the lower end of Gravel Lane, near the water, 
there is a house of public entertainment for the 
godiier sort of seamen ; 't is called the ' Anchor of 
Salvation/ and is kept by Hezekiah Hope, a godly 
woman, and s ted fast in the faith if there ever was 
one. To her you will say — t Tom of the Woods 
salutes thee, in the name of thy father and his old 
friend Ephraim D wight, and by the number and 
token Thirty-jive, and bids thee let me have speech 
of the true man Hiram Bingley \ — and when Hiram 
comes, which he will presently do (he hath a cut 
very like my own across his right brow), you will 
say to him — ' I have befriended Tom of the Woods 
when he hath been in trouble, and now that I am 
in trouble, Tom hath sent me hither to be sheltered 
and succoured by thee : the number and token is 
eleven, being that of the apostles, to the exclusion 
of the traitor Judas Iscariot.' And having once 
said these words, master Walter, you will be safe. 
You may reach Wapping Stairs long before the 
news of what has bean done upon Plumstead Com- 
mon reaches Whitehall. But get down to Wool- 
wich, and take boat immediately. Others may 
tremble, but the son of Captain Wynton hath 
nothing to fear from the sailors on the river." 

u And whither wilt thou betake thyself, poor 
Tom?" asked Walter. 
•, " Oh, I am safe in any part of this well-wooded 



A FIGHT AND A FLIGHT. 137 

country of Kent, and I have had visions that I 
shall be wanted hereabouts, or, mayhap, on tli3 
other side of Gad's Hill." 

" But how shall I find thee again, or hear of 
thee ? " 

To this the Prophet of the Woods replied by 
giving Walter some more names, pass- words, and 
numbers, which the young man wrote on his tablets, 
together with those which he was to make use of 
in RatclifFe Highway. 

By this time Faittout had come to, at least so 
far as to be able to sit up among the furze into 
which he had fallen ; but his face was almost as 
yellow as the flowers of the broom, and he was 
looking about him with wild, half-dreamy eyes. 
The prophet's oaken staff had driven out of the 
poor fellow's head all the little English that had 
ever been in it, and he could only say in French — 
" Where is my master — where are the horses — 
where is my unlucky master ? " Walter made him 
rise, and leading him to the edge of the pit into 
which Sir Ralph had fallen, he pointed downward 
with his finger and said — " There ! " without look- 
ing into the chasm. Tom then took master Walter 
by the arm, and led him with hasty steps to the 
wood from which he had emerged at the most 
critical moment of the fight. The wood at that 
time reached nearly to the bank of the river. As 
they went through it, Tom comforted Walter by 
repeating his assurances that he would communi- 
cate both with Captain Wynton and with Marion 
Hemingford. On the lower skirt of the wood, 
by the marshes, they parted, the prophet with the 
staff in his hand plunging back into the wilderness, 
and the young sailor striding with agitated steps 






138 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

down to the river-side ; for his blood had now 
cooled, and he could not think without horror of 
having taken the life of a fellow -being in a private 
quarrel. As he was getting into a boat, which 
was not procured without difficulty, a number of 
mutinous seamen recognised him, and shouted — 
" Ah, master Walter, things would not have come 
to this pass with us if Captain Wynton had been 
left to command our ship, with you for his lieu- 
tenant ! Master Walter, we be starving ! Remem- 
ber this when you hear blame and shame thrown 
upon us ! " 

Walter threw the poor fellows a little money, 
and then, taking the boat's rudder in his hand, he 
bade the watermen pull away as hard as they could 
for Wapping Old Stairs. 

Before sunset Walter was securely lodged with 
Hiram B'ngley. 



( 139 ) 



CHAPTER VII. 

WAPPING. 

Upon the river, and all through Wapping and the 
populous neighbourhood of Ratcliffe Highway, 
Walter had seen nothing but distressing sights. 
The king's ships seemed to be either deserted by 
their crews or in the hands of mutineers : the flags 
of several of them were hoisted half-mast high, as 
if in mourning, and on their black broadsides were 
chalked the words, " Money ! Money ! No more 
tickets ! Bread for our wives and children I" The 
trading vessels lay huddled together in idle and 
disorderly tiers, with their top-masts struck and 
with great birch-brooms hoisted as if to intimate 
that they were all for sale ; and at times a roar of 
angiy voices came from these tiers of merchant- 
men, saying " Here is a pretty sight ! The traders 
of England cannot go to sea because of the Dutch ! 
Go tell this at Whitehall ! The flag of England 
has become a dirty rag ! The mariners of Eng- 
land be all starving !" On shore the same cries, 
or worse, were heard ; and the haggard looks and 
dirty ragged clothes of thousands of men, women, 
and children in the streets seemed to confirm 
the truth of the outcries. These were things to 
drive a true Englishman, and a born sailor like 
Walter Wynton, to distraction. But what agitated 
him still more was the evidence, now almost every- 



140 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

where given, that the seamen had become indiffer- 
ent to the honour of their country — dead to the 
national pride, without which there can be no 
nation. In nearly every open space he saw groups 
of tattered sailors, listening with sullen, but assent- 
ing countenances, to some demagogue and fanatic, 
who was openly preaching that England was a 
doomed and ruined country ; that the curse of the 
Almighty was upon it ; that the heaviest of judg- 
ments was approaching ; and that the mariners had 
better go and join the Dutch, who w r ere a Protes- 
tant people, and who paid their men, than go out 
and fight against them for a court and government 
that were bringing in Popery, and that paid no- 
body. Walter also found that his host Hiram 
Bingley was a fanatic of the most determined kind, 
one immeasurably more in extremes than Tom of 
the Woods ; and he was not long in discovering 
that Hiram's house — a puzzle of a place, which 
seemed all made up of crooked passages, double doors, 
and cellars with many mysterious outlets — was a 
downright conventicle and conciliabulum, wherein 
were discussed the wildest doctrines of the Fifth 
Monarchy men, and wherein were hatching plots of 
the most desperate description. He saw that to 
attempt to reason with these high-priests of anarchy 
would be worse than useless; but he could not 
stay among them ; he would rather be apprehended 
and hanged for murder ; and on the second morn- 
ing after his arrival, while Hiram was asleep, and 
in a dream wrestling with the Lord for a blessing, 
he left a piece of money on a table, threw an old 
boat-cloak over his dress, put on a sailor's cap, 
and stole out of the house in Gravel Lane. He 
knew not whither to go, but he was scarcely at the 



WAPPING. 141 

top of the lane when he was carried away by a 
great crowd that was rushing to the middle of 
Ratcliffe Highway, shouting and screaming " Hey ! 
hey for Joel Wyke ! Joel is afoot at the Cross to 
tell us what to do. Joel says the hour is come !" 

Walter presently found himself within sight and 
ear-shot of that sea-lawyer, whose sour visage had 
so often disturbed the dreams of the Clerk of the 
Acts of the Navy. Joel was mounted on the top 
of a great tub or butt, with a Bible in one hand 
and a cutlass in the other ; and the doctrine he was 
expounding, being stripped of its cant and blas- 
phemy and frantic rhetoric, came simply to this — 
that the starving and God-fearing sailors ought 
that morning to go and meet the Dutch, and give 
them welcome and assistance. The Dutch fleet he 
assured them was cruising between Harwich and 
the North Foreland, with many righteous English- 
men on board ; and as for the means of conveyance 
down the river, he told his auditors that there was 
a large armed lugger lying off Limehouse Stairs 
which had been for many days in the hands of his 
friends ; that there were three fly-boats or tenders 
I which might be seized ; and that they could also 
I take such merchant-vessels as they thought best ; 
and that there was not anywhere between Wapping 
and the Nore a single king's ship that was in a 
state to oppose their departure. 

A tall, thin, very hungry-looking sailor cried — 

" Then let us sheer off without any more parlaver ! 

j If we stay the length of another day's log I shall 

not have strength enough left in me to get up the 

Dutchman's side. Let us trip anchor and away at 

(once, without playing ' Loth to depart.' " 
" Aye," cried another man's voice in the crowd, 



142 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

"' Let us be gone with this turn of tide. The 
Dutch have dollars for us, as well as meat and 
drink, and they are only wearing off and on, wait- 
ing for us to show them how to do the trick at 
Sheerness and Chatham — and then, my boys, up 
for London again with de Ruyter." 

Here some hems, and coughs, and murmurs 
were heard ; but it was clearly an overwhelming 
majority that shouted " Let us weigh and begone, 
and sing no ' Loth to depart.' It is hard to be 
sorry when we are running from starvation. " 

Walter, who could not imagine that the govern- 
ment or anybody connected with it could be 
aware of this desperation, or believe that any extre- 
mity would drive an English seaman to fight under 
an enemy's flag, now resolved to seek out Mr. 
Pepys, [and, at whatsoever hazard to himself, to re- 
veal all that he had just heard in the highway — 
which he might very well do without any breach 
of confidence to Hiram Bingley and his friends in 
Gravel Lane, who, madmen as they were, had be- 
haved to him with much kindness, and had pledged 
their lives for the defence of his. But master 
Walter had got so wedged in the crowd that he 
could scarcely move ; and in trying to extricate 
himself the old boat-cloak was torn from his 
shoulders, his slouching cap was knocked off, and 
he stood revealed in the garb of a gentleman. That 
instant a hand as hard as a marlin-spike was at his 
throat, and the cry was set up of " Spy ! a spy 
among- us ! Let us hang him before we go !" 

" f 11 be bilboed if you do," cried Will Gaff. 
" This young gentleman is master Walter Wyn- 
ton, the son of my old commander, Captain Wyn- 
ton, and if you don't know him, Jack, there is 



WAPPING. 143 

many an honest man here that does, or may I never 
taste grog again !" 

A score or more sailors that were nearest in- 
stantly declared that it was master Walter Wyn- 
ton, and none but he, and that there was nowhere 
a better friend to the poor sailor. And in the 
heat and fulness of their heart they all swore that 
he could only be there for a good purpose, and 
that no man should touch a hair of his head. Jack 
let go his grip as soon as the name of Wynton was 
first pronounced. Joel, on his tub, waved his 
hand and raised his voice to restore quiet — for the 
long-winded rascal had not half finished his pro- 
posed speech — and, after censuring the men who 
had used such ungodly oaths, he proposed that 
master Walter should stand forth and explain why 
he was there in disguise. 

" That will he do presently, like the true gen- 
tleman that he is," cried Will Gaff. " Make way, 
and lend your ear to master Walter, whose father 
so often belaboured Dutch, French, and Spaniards. 
So now Joel Wyke just break off your yarn and 
splice it again anon, and step down from your 
forecastle, and let the son of our old fighting cap- 
tain give us a word of discourse." 

Walter, who was now close to the foot of Joel's 
rostrum, was considerably perplexed, for he must 
begin with confessing his duel, and he had never 
in his life tried to address a mob or any other 
assemblage either from a tub -head or from any 
other spouting-place ; but Will Gaff whispered in 
his ear, " Get up, master Walter, and stand to 
your quarters for old England ! Tell them it is 
better to starve than to go fight against their own 
flag, and betray all our weakness to the enemy." 



144 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

Thus urged by Gaff, and called upon by many 
others, Walter mounted the rostrum, from which 
Joel Wyke had very sulkily descended. 

" Shipmates ! " said Walter, " the reason of my 
being here slightly disguised is very soon told. I 
have killed in single combat an insolent cavalier, 
one of the King's courtiers " 

" If you had killed the King as well, and the 
Duke after him, it would have been better ! " cried 
several voices at once. 

" If you have slain a courtier, and are at feud 
with the court, and are in danger of its vengeance, 
then will you be a friend to the seamen's cause, and 
away with us to the Dutch, and give a helping 
hand in the overthrowing of this detestable and 
popishly-inclined government," said Joel Wyke. 
" Young man, I think you have said enough, and 
may now step down and let me finish that which I 
was saying." 

" Not yet, not just yet," shouted Will Gaff: 
"go on, master Walter." 

And Walter went on. " You mistake me," s*aid 
he, "if you think that any extremity would drive 
me to bear arms against my country. I do not 
shut my eyes to the lamentable errors and sins of 
the present government, which hath brought such 
shame upon England. I have taken into my own 
hands the right of punishing one who heaped in- 
sult upon the hoary head of my father, and did me 
other wrongs, and for this act — as I can hardly 
hope for an impartial trial — I may, if seized any- 
where in England, be brought to an opprobrious 
death ; yet, rather than join you in going to the 
Dutch, I would be hanged three times over, if I 
had three lives to throw away. I learned my sea- 



WAPPING. 145 

politics in the school of the unselfish and heroical 
Blake, who struck down the insolent broom from 
Van Tromp's mast-head, and did battle for various, 
and quickly varying, English governments. It 
was Blake's saying, that it was not the business of 
sailors to mind state affairs, but to keep foreigners 
from fooling us " 

" Aye," said an old sailor, " and at the com- 
mand of the statesmen that now are, the bones and 
scarcely mouldering flesh of the great Blake were 
dug out of their grave and cast out of Westminster 
Abbey, as if they had been the remains of a traitor 
or of some unclean animal. I — I who fought un- 
der Blake in twenty victorious fights — saw the 
mortal part of my great commander thus treated, 
and the sight filled my mouth with curses, and my 
heart with bitterness, and with hatred of this re- 
stored government." 

This short speech of the old sailor excited the 
mob so much that there was a hooting' and veiling 1 
which lasted for some minutes. When the noise 
subsided, Walter said, " I too saw that unseemly 
sight, and loathed it as much as any man that saw 
. it. But Blake had a soul to despise such paltry 
malignity. They might cast out the mortal frag- 
ments of the man upon the dung-heap, but they 
can never destroy his fame, or the memory and 
love of him in the heart of every true English 
sailor. If Blake could speak from the grave, he 
would still tell ye to stand by your country's flag, 
however the country may be misgoverned ; he 
would tell you to look to English hearts and Eng- 
lish hands for the redress of grievances and the 
reformation of the state, but to die rather than 
help to destroy your own navy and bring a foreign 



146 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

foe — the Dutch, whom he, with your good aid, so 
often beat — into the heart of our country." 

The young orator was evidently making some 
impression even upon the worst part of that turbu- 
lent audience ; but Joel Wyke twanged loudly 
through his nose, "But there is no longer any 
country left ! This is not our Israel, but a land of 
prelates and Philistines. We may no longer wor- 
ship the Lord after our own hearts. It offers to 
us, the chosen and the godly, nothing but scourges 
and pillories, the prison and the gallows ! It is 
no longer our country, and we have no birthright 
in it." 

The fanatics said, " Yea ! and Amen ! " But 
these men, who had been preached out of their 
senses, were far fewer in number than those whom 
sheer hunger had driven out of their patriotism ; 
and the orator who closed the debate was that tall, 
lank, and very hungry -looking seaman, who now 
said, " The young gentleman who hath spoken so 
prettily is not starving, and we are. Therefore let 
us cast loose and be off to get food while we can, 
and let us carry this master Walter with us, will 
he nill he, for we may want a knowing officer 
a- board ; and if he stay here the chances are, upon 
his own showing, that he will be taken and hanged 
for killing one of those scoundrels who have turned 
our bountiful old mother into a cruel step-mother r 
and have made England no country for us." 

Walter sprung to the spot where Will Gaff was 
standing, laid his hand to the hi It of his sword, 
and shouted, " Stand by me, all ye that have Eng- 
lish hearts, and this great shame shall not fall upon 
our flag ! " 

But alas ! though Will Gaff had a majority in 



CAPPING. 147 

the riot at the Navy-office, he was wofully in the 
minority now ; for three months of want and mi- 
sery to the men, and of broken promises and crimi- 
nal neglect in the government, had wrought the 
most pernicious effects. There seemed not one 
man in twenty to answer "Will Gaff's calls of 
" Rescue master Walter ; let us not be traitors to 
England ! ,? 

Joel Wyke and other desperadoes seized both 
Walter and Will Gaff, and tied their arms behind 
them ; a voice cried, " Speaker Joel, no more 
speeches ; we shall lose the tide :" and the dense 
mob began to roll along the highway like water 
through an open floodgate, carrying with it what- 
ever lies in; its course. As soon as the rush 
began, some fellows in the rear, either believing or 
inventing the case, shouted, " Get on there ahead 
— the King's cutthroats are coming dow T n upon us 
from the Tower ; we hear horses galloping and 
swords rattling ! " At this cry the torrent rushed 
on more rapidly and wildly than before ; those w 7 ho 
were unwilling to go with the mutineers, or un- 
able through weakness to keep pace with them, 
were thrown down and trampled under foot, and 
none stopped to help them. They w r ent through 
narrow intricate lanes down to the water-side and 
to Limehouse Stairs. But before they got to the 
appointed place of embarkation their numbers 
were very materially diminished : some of the men 
could not keep up their hearts to the horrible in- 
tent : some were moved from their purpose by the 
prayers and tears of their mothers and wives, who 
clung to them or pulled them in at their open 
doors as they passed by their habitations ; and others 



148 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

were deterred by their dread of the gallows, and 
slipped away as they came to the cross-lanes and 
alleys. But Walter Wynton and Will Gaff being 
in the head of the torrent, bound and surrounded 
by the most desperate men, and narrowly watched 
by Joel Wyke himself, who kept waving his cut- 
lass and crying, " The sword of the Lord and of 
Gideon ! " could nowhere see the slightest chance 
of escaping; and when they reached the stairs, 
and Walter would have made a last effort to bring 
the men back to a sense of their duty to their coun- 
try, Joel and that other lean sailor who had dis- 
tinguished himself at the Cross rudely and brutally 
gagged him w r ith a neckerchief. 

The armed lugger, with her guns run out, and 
with a black flag instead of a blue-peter flying at 
her top, lay right off the stairs, and seemed mistress 
of all that part of the river : boats were in readi- 
ness to carry off the mutineers, and while they were 
embarking in large parties, two sloops which had 
been serving as fly-boats or tenders to the King's 
fleet, crossed the river and lay to. Walter and 
Will Gaff were carried off to the lugger in the first 
boat ; and when the rapid embarkation was finished, 
from two hundred to three hundred sailors were 
shipped in the lugger or in the two fly-boats. 
More than a hundred had stolen away from the 
wharf at the last moment ; and one party had put 
back when they were almost alongside the lugger. 
But though there were several king's ships at 
hand, not the slightest opposition was offered ; and 
as the mutineers got under sail, such seamen as 
were left on board the merchant-ships gave them 
three cheers. To such a temper had a thoughtless 



WAPPING. 149 

and base government brought the brave mariners 
of England ! It had taken seven years to do it, 
but the woful consummation had come at last. 

Favoured by wind as well as by tide, the muti- 
nous flotilla ran rapidly down the river, with the 
black flag at the mizen, and the national standard 
dragging over their poops as a thing dishonoured 
and disowned. Still no opposition was offered to 
their progress. Between Greenwich and Deptford 
there lay a good many king's ships, and some of 
the highest rate then known ; but for the most part 
they had neither powder nor shot on board ; and 
some were deserted by their crews, and the captains 
and officers of others were away, amusing them- 
selves at the courtly end of London. One sturdy 
old captain got a great gun loaded and pointed at 
the armed lugger ; but his men gathered round the 
breech of the gun, and swore that it should not 
be fired at their countrymen and brothers, who 
were only seeking how to escape from starvation. 

As the lugger shot into Erith reach and allowed 
Walter's eye to rest for a few minutes upon the 
ivyed church, and the village, and the mansion of 
Sir John Roundtree standing on the green hill 
behind, among the old patriarchal trees, he was so 
overcome by his feelings, that he would have 
thrown himself over the mutinous ship's side, and, 
pinioned and gagged as he was, have tried to swim 
ashore, if he had not been prevented by some of 
the sailors. In the Upper Hope there were more 
frigates and ships of the line ; and again in the 
Lower Hope there were king's ships ; but their 
condition was not better than that which has been 
described already ; and onward the mutineers went, 
without hindrance or challenge. At the Nore and 

H 



150 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

the mouth of the Medway there were no guard- 
ships — they had been ordered up the Medway to 
look for a shameful protection from land-forts and 
certain other contemptible defences. As the lugger 
stood into the mouth of that river, to enable Joel 
Wyke ,and his friends to reconnoitre, a few shot 
were fired at her from the fort at Sheerness, but 
the balls, which had been made for guns of a dif- 
ferent calibre, fell wide of their mark, and only 
made some splashes in the water ; and having seen 
all that they wanted to see, the mutineers stood 
off with insulting cheers. 

From the mouth of the Medway the flotilla 
made for the Essex coast and the mouth of the 
Orwell, expecting to find a part of the Dutch fleet 
off Harwich, or off Landguard fort. In the latter 
part of their course not a ship of any flag was to 
be seen ; the whole commerce of England was pal- 
sied, and even the few fishing-boats that were afloat 
were hugging the coast, in evident fear of quitting 
it. As they got into that rough water not inaptly 
named " the Devil's Bowling-green," they heard 
at long intervals a gun fired at sea, but the sound 
came from a distant quarter, and not a sail was to 
be seen. 

" Those heavy -breeched Dutchmen are always 
behind time," said some of the mutineers. 

" Mayhap,'' said Joel Wyke, " they have misap- 
prehended signals, and a part of them may have 
gone round the North Foreland to southward, to 
make sure that we have no ships in the Downs. 
Put a stopper upon your blasphemy, and we will 
send a fly-boat for to see, and then have prayers 
on board and crave the Lord's blessing on what we 
are about." 



WAPPING. 151 

Some of the tars said they would rather have a 
dram of the bottle; others, that they would rather not 
have God's name mentioned in the business — for, 
albeit they had done what they had done and were 
a-doing, they were rather afraid that, next to hun- 
ger, it was the devil that had most to do in it ; and 
others said that they had better make at once for 
the Dogger Bank, as they must starve or go a 
plundering on shore if the Mynheers delayed com- 
ing, there being absolutely nothing on board, ex- 
cept water and a few mouldy biscuits. Joel Wyke, 
however, succeeded in sending away one of the fly- 
boats to look round the North Foreland. "Walter 
and Will Gaff were now unbound ; but they were 
forced down into the cabin and there confined, two 
desperadoes, with cutlasses in their hands, mount- 
ing guard at the cabin-door. Joel was still afraid 
that if the young officer were allowed to speak with 
the men, he might make them relent, and cause a 
new mutiny among his mutineers. 

The sun was now setting behind the Essex hills, 
and the breeze began to freshen from the south- 
east, making a still heavier swell in that unplea- 
sant Bowling-green. The night came on rather 
dark and hazy, clouds covered the moon, and a 
bank of sea -fog concealed the coast of Essex and 
Suffolk. About the midnight watch some more 
firing was heard. It was like the firing of signal- 
guns ; but, although the sound seemed to proceed 
from a nearer quarter, it was still far out at 
sea. There was great anxiety and commotion on 
board the lugger, which either lay to, or kept 
standing off and on. In one of their tacks the 
mutineers saw a red light glimmering through the 
mist, and at the sight some score of them set up a 

h 2 



152 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

wretched cry, that it was a king's ship coming 
down upon them, and that to save their lives they 
ought to run their lugger ashore and then aban- 
don her. The light came from a little fishing- 
boat : but an evil conscience had taken the heart 
out of these naturally brave fellows. That short 
summer's night, however, soon wore away, and as 
the disc of the sun began to appear above the broad 
waters, a morning-gun was heard booming at no 
great distance ; and, shortly after, tall masts and 
sails were seen slowly rising to the north-east, be- 
hind Orfordness ; and by the time the sun was 
fairly risen, more than twenty sail were seen, 
stretching in a long loose line from north to south. 
The sun shone out majestically ; the wind had 
changed ; the fresh morning breeze swept away the 
last remnant of the sea-fog : it was a glorious 
June day ; and land and sea, the one with its towns 
and villages, and the other with the great ships 
upon it, were cheerful and beautiful to the eye. 

As Walter looked out at the narrow cabin- 
window he forgot for a moment that he was in the 
hands of mutineers and traitors, and that those 
proud and fair ships that were standing on in the 
most beautiful and seamanlike order for the broad 
and silvery estuary of the Thames, were carrying 
dishonour and destruction for his country : but he 
was soon made acutely sensible to all this woe ; for 
the lugger stood away to meet the nearest of the 
Dutch ships of war, and as she got under her lee 
the mutineers gave three cheers, and were answered 
with three cheers by the Dutchmen. Boats were 
lowered, and Joel Wyke told Walter and Will 
Gaff that they must go in the first boat to the 
Dutch ship. It was vain to remonstrate, for the 



WAPPING. 153 

lugger was right under the guns of the Dutchman. 
As Gaff went over the side he shook his fist at 
Joel Wyke and said — " This is dirty work, Joel ! 
Thou hast brought us to a pretty pass, thou foul 
sea-lawyer I But look to thyself, for I have a 
notion that thou wilt get thy brains knocked out 
before this is over!" Joel grinned a malicious 
grin to express his triumph over his rival orator 
Will ; and then putting on his demurest and most 
sanctified face, he twanged through his nose — " It 
is the Lord's will — all this is the will of the Lord, 
and the Lord will protect his own." 

The Dutch captain and most of his officers be- 
haved with delicacy and kindness to Walter 
Wynton, as soon as they learned his story, which 
he told in brief indignant language. 

" I cannot put you on shore," said the captain, 
" and I must not let you prevent these starvelings 
and desperadoes of your countrymen from assisting 
us in the enterprise we have in hand, and which 
we would hardly have undertaken if King Charles 
had not driven these sailors desperate and so sent 
them to help us ; but as an officer and gentleman 
I will call upon you for no service whatsoever 
against your country, nor request more from you 
than that you will be silent — strictly silent and 
neutral, for I have so many Englishers on board 
that 

Here the Dutch captain stopped short and redden- 
ed a little. When he continued, he said that Walter 
was free to use his cabin and the quarter-deck, and 
that he should have his sword, which he perceived 
the mutineers had taken from him ; and he con- 
cluded the conversation by saying — " Last year 
your Sir Eobert Holmes surprised and burned with 



154 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

his fire-ships one hundred and seventy of our help- 
less merchant vessels under Ulie and Schevling, and 
this year, d' ye' see, we mean to pay you back by 
burning* a few of your men-of-war at Chatham and 
Deptford : so now, young gentleman, take a glass of 
Schiedam and down with me to breakfast." 

As he had tasted nothing for the last four-and- 
twenty hours, Walter hastily swallowed a few 
mouthfuls. The Dutch captain, in his eagerness 
to do his own duty and gain information for the 
guidance of his admiral, forgot his delicacy so far 
as to put some questions about the defences on the 
river Thames, and the state of preparation of 
the King's ships that were lying up that river ; but 
Walter soon stopped these queries by reminding 
the Dutchman that he had promised to be strictly 
silent and neutral so long as he remained a prisoner 
on board his ship. 

In the meanwhile Joel Wyke had transferred 
nearly all his men from the lugger and the fly- 
boat to the Dutch ship, and had received a sum of 
money in hard dollars to distribute among them. 
The hungry mutineers had, moreover, received 
abundant rations, and whole kegs of Dutch gin. 
Although many of them had kept out of sight be- 
tween-decks, it was easy for Walter, on returning 
to the quarter-deck, to discover thar there were 
many more Englishmen on board than Joel had 
brought. Some of these men were sitting between 
the guns, discussing doctrinal points, interpreting 
prophecies, and promising to each other the speedy 
coming of the reign of the Saints. These were 
Fifth-Monarchy men, whose sheer fanaticism had 
made them traitors. There were Anabaptists, who 
regarded J ohn of Munster as a saint and martyr ; 



WAPPING. 155 

there were a few Adamites, who thought that 
righteousness consisted in going stark naked, with- 
out so much as a fig-leaf, as Adam did before the 
fall ; there were Salmonites, or the followers of 
one Salmon, a mad preacher of Coventry, who had 
held that swearing and cursing, and all manner of 
carnal sin and dissoluteness, were not only allow- 
able but commendable, forasmuch as it was natural 
for men to gratify their natural appetites, and no 
man could curse and swear unless God allowed it ; 
there were TVykites, or the disciple of one Wyke 
(a first cousin to our acquaintance Joel), who had 
reduced all the doctrines and rites of religion into 
three hugs and three kisses, with which he pre- 
tended that the Heavenly spirit might be breathed 
into any man or any woman. Apart from these 
were other groups of old sea-men, with faces 
equally sour and austere, who were talking of 
kirks, presbyters, and elders, covenants and John 
Knox. These were Presbyterians, and mostly 
Scotsmen, who abhorred their brother deserters 
the Fifth- Monarchy men, and their doctrines, as 
much as they did the Episcopalian Church, from 
whose tyranny they all declared themselves to have 
fled. There were men of other sects of the most 
fantastic and yet fanatic character, who all pre- 
tended that they were fighting for religious liberty, 
although there was not one of them but would 
have wielded the sword of persecution if it had 
been strong enough — not one but would fain have 
attempted to impose its rule of faith, doctrine, and 
worship upon all the rest, and upon the whole of 
the three nations of England, Scotland, and Ire- 
land : — 



156 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

" Sure I have the truth/' says Numph ,- 

" Nay, 1 have the truth," says Clem ; 

" Nay, I have the truth," says reverend Ruth ; 

" Nay, I have the truth," says Nem. 

There were also men who had been driven to their 
present madness by their Republican enthusiasm^ 
or by an enthusiasm for some other untried mode 
of government ; but, after all, the far greater 
number of these English deserters, or traitors, were 
simple men, who troubled their heads very little 
either about rules of faith or forms of govern- 
ment, and whose logic lay all in their stomachs. 

As the fleet proceeded under easy sail, the fly* 
boat, which Joel had sent round the North Fore- 
land, came back with certain intelligence that there 
were no English men-of-war there, and with the 
report that, with the exception of a few French 
men-of-war (the allies of the Dutch), there was 
no ship in the Channel. Some of the English 
sailors were now removed from the ship in which 
Walter Wynton had the misery to be, to other 
vessels in the Dutch fleet, which had kept concen- 
trating, and so increasing in number that Walter 
could now count, within a narrow compass, more 
than forty sail of all rates. Never did sailor re- 
turning home from a long voyage wish so passion- 
ately for a fair wind as Walter now wished for a 
foul one. He prayed for a storm — for a tempest 
to scatter this proud armament, and so save the 
flag of England from this disgrace ; but the sum- 
mer wind blew softly and favourably for the 
Dutch, whose mighty fleet still kept increasing. 
Admiral de Ruyter had brought the whole of his 
fleet out of the Wierings, and the rest of the ships 



WAPPING. 157 

from the Texel had joined, or were joining him, 
under the command of Yan Ghent, who had been 
running all along our eastern coast, from the 
mouth of the Orwell to the Frith of Forth, and, 
to distract attention, cannonading Burnt-island, 
and menacing our shipping in Leith harbour : so 
that it was with eighty sail of men-of-war, and 
many fire-ships, that the Dutch bore up for the 
Nore, to the great consternation of the people of 
Kent, who were seen flying from all the villages 
and houses near the sea, and running up into the 
country with their moveable property. 



h3 



( 158 ) 



CHAPTER VIII. 



THE MEDWAY. 



It was on the morning of the tenth of June that 
de Kuyter and Van Ghent came up to the Nore. 
While some of their ships were ordered to prepare 
for the attack of the contemptible fortifications of 
Sheerness, upon which the government relied for 
the security of the river Med way and the ships 
and the dockyards at Chatham, others were sent 
up the Thames. The latter division, tiring off 
great guns, which were distinctly heard in the city 
of London, proceeded almost as far as Gravesend ; 
and might have gone up much higher if they had 
been but a little bolder, there being scarcely any- 
thing to offer them a valid resistance. In Tilbury 
fort there were many guns, but scarcely any pow- 
der ; and beyond, some bulwarks which had been 
hastily thrown up on the other side of the river, and 
which could not have withstood the fire of a single 
ship for half an hour. There was powder, but 
scarcely any guns ; and the force here stationed 
consisted wholly of " a great many idle lords 
and gentlemen with their pistols and fooleries." 
But these Dutchmen, after making a terrible hub- 
bub, and scaring away the people from Gravesend 
and Erith, and from all the towns and villages on 
either bank of the river, fell down from the Lower 
Hope and Shellhaven, and joined their comrades at 



THE MEDWAY. 159 

Sheerness. Those contemptible works were at- 
tacked in the evening, and were laid even with the 
ground and carried in about two hours. There 
were brave men and some excellent English officers 
who had fought behind those miserable works ; 
but they were few in number and were totally un- 
provided with the means of defending that import- 
ant and vital position. As they retreated across 
the isle of Sheppey, the Dutch lowered their boats 
and landed a great number of men, land-troops as 
well as sailors, and took possession of Sheerness, as 
if with the intention of fortifying it and keeping it. 
De Ruyter was a brave and most sturdy officer ; 
he had shown an indomitable courage in a score of 
great battles, and he had displayed wonderful for- 
titude in adverse circumstances ; but he had some 
of the slowness and excess of circumspection which 
it has been the fashion to attribute to his country- 
men. His present delays did not save England 
from disgrace, but they greatly diminished his 
power of doing mischief. After lying a whole day 
at the Nore before commencing his attack on 
Sheerness, he remained another day and two nights 
at that place, apparently doing nothing at all 
beyond sending one Doleman, a proscribed English 
Republican, with a party of English mutineers, 
across the isle of Sheppey, to make a fruitless at- 
tempt to excite the men of Kent to insurrection 
against King Charles. And although everything 
remained to the last in a frightful state of disorder 
(not one man in a hundred in the service of the 
English government doing his duty, or knowing 
how to do it), some part of the time which the 
Dutch allowed them was advantageously employed 
by the English. 



160 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

On Tuesday the 11th of June, General Monk— * 
now Duke of Albemarle and commander-in-chief of 
the land forces, who had been sent by the king to 
perform duties and to make defences which ought 
to have been intrusted not to a land but to a sea 
commander, or rather which ought not to have 
been needed at all — arrived at Chatham, and found 
that of twelve hundred men employed in the dock- 
yard, four hundred had fled, and that those who re- 
mained were so distracted with fear or with famine, 
or so exasperated by want of pay, that no good 
service could be expected from them. There was 
scarcely a charge of gunpowder to be found, so 
that Monk was obliged to send to Gravesend for 
ammunition, which did not arrive until two o'clock 
the next day. If the Dutch had gone upwards at 
once, not a shot could have been fired against 
them ; but they did nothing during the 11th, but 
take soundings among some sunken ships which 
had been scuttled near the mouth of the Medway 
in the absurd intention of blocking up the broad 
and deep bed of the river. But on the following 
morning — the memorable morning of the 12th 
of June — a very fresh wind from the north-east 
blew over Sheerness and the Dutch fleet, and a 
strong spring- tide set the same way as the wind, 
raising and pouring the waters upward from the 
broad estuary in a mighty current. And now de 
Ruyter roused himself from his inactivity, and gave 
orders to his second in command, Admiral Van 
Ghent, to ascend the river towards Chatham with 
fire-ships, and fighting ships of various rates. 
Previously to the appearance of de Ruyter on our 
coasts, his grace of Albemarle had sunk a few ves- 
sels about Muscle Bank, at the narrowest part of 



THE MED WAY. 161 

the river, had constructed a boom, and drawn a 
big iron chain across the river from bank to bank, 
and within the boom and chain he had stationed 
three king's ships ; and having done these notable 
things, he had written to court that all was safe on 
the Sled way, and that the Dutch would never be 
able to break through his formidable defences. 
But now Yan Ghent gave his grace the lie direct ; 
for, favoured by the heady current and strong wind, 
the prows of his ships broke through the boom and 
iron chain as though they had been cobwebs, and 
fell with an overwhelming force upon the ill- 
manned and ill-managed ships which had been 
brought down the river to eke out this wretched 
line of defence. The three ships, the ' Unity/ the 
■ Matthias,' and the ' Charles the Fifth,' which 
had been taken from the Dutch in the course of 
the preceding year — the Annus Mirabilis of 
Dryden's flattering poem — were presently recap- 
tured and burned under the eyes of the Duke of 
Albemarle, and of many thousands of Englishmen 
who had gathered near the banks of the Medway ; 
but who had no batteries, no mounted guns, no 
barges, no boats, no means whatever of taking part 
in the action, or of preventing the disgrace they 
witnessed. Monk was not devoid of courage, and 
there was bravery enough, and to spare, among 
those who surrounded him. But what could it 
boot without nantical skill, and without proper 
arms and materials wherewith to fight ? My lord 
general knew not what orders to give, and those 
which he gave were not obeyed. As Yan Ghent 
was first approaching the chain, Monk pointed to 
his king's ships, and said with a flourish that it was 
the duty of brave and loyal men to defend those 



162 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

vessels, and that such as were brave and loyal 
would follow him and die on board rather than see 
the ships taken and destroyed. And immediately 
after this speech he and a good number of volun- 
teers put off in such skiffs as could be procured, 
and got on board the largest of the three ships with 
nothing but swords or pikes in their hands. But 
when they were in the ship they found that they 
could do nothing with her, and that they had 
better get to shore again as fast as possible. And 
it was well that they did so, for one of Yan Ghent's 
fire-ships came up, and embraced with a death-hug 
that royal ship ; and she and her two consorts, to- 
gether with sundry merchant vessels laden and 
ready for sea, were presently in a blaze. Having 
done this exploit, and laughed at the iron chain, 
the Dutchmen addressed themselves to that right 
noble ship the c Royal Charles/ which had been 
left down the river in an exposed situation, and 
in the most helpless condition, although, many 
days, nay, weeks, before, strict orders had been 
given by the Duke of York to take her up to 
Chatham. 

As Van Ghent wore round the point opposite 
the Stray, with six men-of-war and five fire-ships, 
he opened a cannonade rather upon the useless 
people on shore than at the undefended ship ; and 
the English renegadoes and fanatics that were 
serving with him gave three tremendous cheers, 
and uttered the most insulting taunts. These men, 
who were otherwise well informed of the state of 
affairs on shore, and up the river, could, whenever 
the smoke cleared away, easily distinguish my lord 
general, with his baton of command in hand, riding 
hither and thither with his brilliant but bewildered 



THE MED WAT. 163 

and utterly useless staff; and against him, as the 
chief agent in the unconditional restoration of 
Charles II., they directed most of their invectives. 
Speaker Joel made a long running commentary. 
As his men let off the Dutch guns and threw the 
balls on shore, he shouted — " Master Monk ! here 
be beads for thee to tell ! Take that, thou traitor 
to God and man, and the true servants of God ! 
Take that, false Monk ! and get thee home to the 
drab thy wife, whom slaves do call my lady and 
duchess, and tell her, in her own language, that, 
after all thy shiftings and turnings, thou hast 
brought thy hogs to a pretty market ! Get thee 
hence, thou betrayer of thy country ! And ye 
blustering, vapouring, blaspheming cavaliers, get 
ye all hence with him, for what deed can ye 
perform here ? Ye could bring Sir Harry Vane to 
the block, but here be blocks and tackle ye cannot 
handle ! Ye could conquer that godly wine-cooper 
Venner, in London, and Oldroyd, that other servant 
of the saints, in Yorkshire, — ye could hang up 
Rathbone and Flint, and scores of godly but de- 
fenceless men, as stoutly as Oliver or the Rump 
could have done it ! Ye could make false plots 
and acts of Parliament to meet them, and so destroy 
the disarmed ; but your acts of Parliament will 
not quench these fires, or stop these cannon -balls ! 
Since ye will not be gone, and since ye can in no 
wise defend your country, then stay and weep blood 
for the shame ye have brought upon her. Aye ! 
foul Monk ! stay there on the river bank, shaking 
thy gold -headed stick, and see the royal navy of 
England in flames, and hear the Dutch roaring 
with their guns within hearing of London ! Thou 
hast neither a hand to help nor a heart to feel 
the misery and infamy thou hast brought upon a 



164 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

betrayed and ruined people ! But England will 
mourn for this in sackcloth and ashes, and thou 
and thy master will be rewarded for it. Tophet 
is hot ! " 

Others of the deserters, as they eyed their coun- 
try's undefended and indefensible ships, shouted to 
one another — " There, a little higher up, lies old 
Blake's flag-ship, — there lies our own old ship the 
JSTaseby ! — there's the Speaker; — there the tough 
old Fairfax, — there the lucky old Victory, that 
we fought ten good battles in ; — but have at 'em 
all ! — let 'em blaze in a heap, since they have 
changed their names, and turned us adrift to starve ! 
So have at 'em, comrades ! We be fighting for 
dollars now, and will get good change for our old 
.tickets before this brush be over ! The man at 
Whitehall shall know what it is to wrong the 
.English sailors !" 

Much of this talk or outcry was distinctly heard 
by the Englishmen on shore, the best of whom 
hung down their heads in shame and confusion. 
But Walter Wynton, who lost not a syllable of it — 
Walter Wynton, who was in the midst of these 
desperadoes and fanatics, (the Dutch ship in which 
he was a prisoner having come up from Sheer ness 
with Van Ghent,) was transported almost into a 
dfrenzy. Thinking not of the pledge the Dutch 
captain had exacted from him, he reprehended 
Joel Wyke, and even seized that malignant by the 
throat, as he was leading the anti-national chorus, 
and exciting his countrymen into a forgetfulness 
of every feeling for their country. He then rushed 
below deck to avoid the maddening sight ; but he 
could not stay there, and he rushed back to the 
quarter-deck as if compelled to gaze upon what his 
soul abhorred, or as if he could not credit what he 



THE MEDWAY. 16<5> 

saw and heard, or as if he fancied that the spectacle of 
the negligence and helplessness of the English ships 
must presently be succeeded by some terrible and 
unexpected manoeuvre, or some mighty display of 
forces and means, hitherto concealed, which should 
drive Van Ghent with loss and shame back to the 
Nore, or annihilate him where he was. But when 
Walter saw, on coming close alongside, that the 
c Royal Charles,' one of the largest and finest 
ships in the world, was grounded, immoveable, 
helpless, and altogether deserted ; — when he saw a 
Dutch boat with only nine men (and half of them 
English) put off and board and take her, without 
so much as a musket-shot being fired at the board- 
ers ; and when he saw one single man, enveloped 
in the smoke of the Dutch guns, go up and strike 
her flag and jack, and heard a trumpeter sound 
upon her quarter-deck, " Joan's placket is torn," 
the brave son of the fighting Captain Wynton 
could stand it no longer. He ran below, and re- 
mained there for a good many minutes with his 
blushing, burning face buried in his hands. Then, 
fresh shouts made him run back — to see the Dutch 
flag hoisted on the ' Charles.' At this moment of 
shame and desperation, as he dashed some big 
tears from his eyes, he caught sight of the honest, 
right-down English face of Will Gaff, who seemed 
to be scarcely less affected than he was himself, 
Gaff was standing on the bulwarks in the waist of 
the ship, holding on by the main shrouds. Walter 
made a rush to him and said, " Will, this is no 
sight for an Englishman to see ! This is not to 
be borne !" 

" That 's what I have been thinking this last 
hour and more," said Will ; u and may I perish if 



166 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

I stand it any longer !" And, as the last word 
was on his lips, Will threw himself overboard, and 
was followed in the twinkling of an eye by master 
Walter. Both went over the ship's side before 
any of the Dutch seamen had a notion of their 
desperate intent; but Joel Wyke, who had an 
eye upon Walter, now came amid-ships crying, 
" Desertion ! Flight of prisoners !" and taking his 
gun from a Dutch soldier, he fired it, not at Wal- 
ter, but at the head of the man in the world he 
most hated — at the head of his rival in oratory 
or speech-making, poor Will Gaff, who had just 
come to the surface of the water after his plunge, 
and was striking away for shore like a good 
bold swimmer. The malicious bullet whistled 
close by the wet ear of Will, and made him say 
to himself, " An inch nearer, and I should have 
sung Peccavi !" He then cried out to Walter, 
who was close in his wake, " Dive ! master Wal- 
ter, dive !" And, to get at longer quarters, they 
both went under, like water-fowl, and so swam 
good twelve fathoms farther from the ship. 
The malignant Joel had seized a second gun and 
was taking a deliberate aim at the nearer re- 
appearing head of Walter, when a Dutch officer 
struck him with the back of his sword over the 
elbow, and with sundry " for-damnings," told 
him that he was a savage, unnatural scoundrel, 
and that Admiral Van Ghent wanted no such foul 
services as that. No attempt was made to stop 
the progress of the two brave swimmers, or to re- 
capture them by sending a boat after them. The 
stout old Dutch captain, while doing his duty to 
his own flag and country, could feel for the pa- 
triotism of other men, and for the peculiar and most 



THE MEDWAY. 167 

cruel situation in which Walter Wynton had been 
placed. He thought that a single young officer, 
who certainly would do him no good if he stayed, 
could do no harm if he escaped ; and so sad and 
heart-touching had been his countenance and be- 
haviour, and the few words he had uttered during 
his imprisonment on board, that he was glad he 
was gone, looking, with an old sailor superstition, 
upon his departure as the removal of an evil omen. 
Being thus unexpectedly left to themselves, such 
good swimmers as Walter and Will Gaff could 
have no great difficulty in making shore. But as 
the tide was running upward with great strength 
and velocity, they were borne away by it, and 
could not gain the bank of the river until they 
came to a small projecting shoal some distance 
above Stoke, and about midway beween that vil- 
lage and the little hamlet of Hoo. Here they 
landed, wet and weary enough. The spot, a long- 
narrow strip of marshy land, seemed as solitary as 
the coast of an uninhabited island ; but they had 
scarcely begun to shake the water from such of 
their garments as they yet retained (for part of their 
dress had been cast off in the river that they might 
swim the better), 'ere they were surrounded and 
seized by a score of Kentish boors, who, armed 
with scythes, bill-hooks, and other agricultural 
or ruder implements, sprang out from some bushes 
and tall growing reeds, roaring, " Down, Dutch, 
down ! The men of Kent be upon ye ! There 
be no English traitors here to help ye I" Walter 
and Will, who had scarcely recovered their breath, 
merely said that they w r ere no Dutchmen, but 
Englishmen. " Then/' said the excited and never 
very quick-sighted peasants, " ye be English trai- 



168 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

tors that have come up with the Dutch ships, and 
that now come hither to look for false men to aid 
ye, as that devil Doleman is a-doing across the 
river at Gillingham. But the men of Gillingham 
be as sound at heart as their own cherries. Dole- 
man and his traitorous crew, perchance, may fire 
the village and cut down the cherry-trees ; but 
they will find not one traitor there save themselves. 
And as for you pair of runagates, we will hand ye 
over to safe prison." 

" Or," said one of the rustic company, " as there 
be not prisons enough to hold so many traitors as 
have declared against king and country, in these 
last days, suppose we take them up to Hoo, and 
hang them ourselves off-hand on the tallest tree 
in our churchyard ?" 

" Marry !" quoth Will Gaff, who had now quite 
recovered his breath ; "it were too hard to be 
hanged so soon after escaping drowning and 
shooting besides ! Hold off! I tell ye we be true 
Englishmen — I tell ye, above all, that this young 
gentleman is a true gentleman and a worshipful, 
albeit he hath neither beaver nor coat, and his hose 
be but muddy. He and I were forcibly carried 
away by the rebellious seamen in Ratcliffe-highway, 
and were put on board one of those broad-sterned 
Dutchmen, from which we have just escaped by 
leaping overboard. So avast ! I say. Or what- 
ever you may do with me, who am but a poor 
tarpaulin, and used to rough it, take your hands 
off this person of honour, who is not accustomed 
to rough usage." 

The bumpkins shook their heads, and said that 
Will's story was not a very probable one. Master 
Walter told it with a little more detail, and assured 



THE MEDWAY. 169 

them that he was not only a true Englishman, and 
one ready to die for his country, but also a true- 
born Kentish man like themselves. He named his 
father, Captain Wynton, and Sir John Round tree ; 
but to these stay-at-home churls Charlton and 
Erith were places too remote for them to know 
anything about those who dwelt at them. While 
this conversation lasted the Dutch guns kept roar- 
ing in the river, a Dutch fire-ship exploded with a 
terrific noise, and the smoke from the cannon, the 
fire-ship, and the burning English ships became so 
dense as to obscure the bright summer sun. This 
was enough to keep up the ill-humour and suspicion 
of the poor peasants ; and, moreover, just as Walter's 
explanations and assurances were beginning to make 
a favourable impression, a Dutch barge, full of 
armed men, was seen crossing the river from Gil- 
lingham, and making what appeared to be signals 
to some persons on shore on this side of the river. 
In the next instant a swivel placed in the bow of 
the barge was fired, and the ball passed over their 
heads. Upon this the peasants beat a retreat from 
the water's edge, going off in the direction of Hoo, 
and carrying their two prisoners with them. They 
marched for some distance across a low flat swampy 
country — a part of Hoo marshes ; but scarcely had 
they crossed the first low ridge of clay hills which 
rise above the bank of the Medway, a little below 
Hoo Church, when they saw a great force of men 
marching towards the river. 

No uniforms or military dresses of any kind were 
discernable in this host ; yet, distant as it was, 
Walter could perceive that it was formed, and was 
marching, in something very like good military 
order. The peasants halted on the inward slope of 



170 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

the hills, gazing and marvelling much ; but pre- 
sently when they made out a banner with the large 
rude figure of a white horse upon it, they set up a 
joyous shout, and cried, " There 's the old banner 
of Kent ! Yon be true j Kentish men !" As the 
host came nearer, Walter perceived that they were 
dragging some artillery with them — and were 
dragging it with the strength of their own arms 
across a rough muddy country where there was 
scarcely anything deserving the name of a road, 
the soil being deep and heavy, and it being an old 
proverb which said — 

He that rides into the Hundred of Hoo, 
Besides tippling sailors will find mud enew. 

At the sight he joined the peasants in their loud 
and joyous shouting. Will Gaff, whose cheering 
was distinctly heard above all the other voices, 
said, after the third cheer, " Master Walter, if 
these honest men bring but ball and powder as 
well as guns, we may put some bitter salt upon the 
tails of the Dutch before they get out of this river." 

" Perchance we may," said Walter; " but who 
have we there marching in the head of that host ? 

As I live it is none other than Tom of the 

Woods!" 

At the hearing of Tom's name some of the pea- 
sants almost shuddered with awe, for although 
they had never seen him in the body, they had all 
heard of his prophesyings. Walter himself was 
for a moment rather uneasy, doubting whether 
Tom's persecutions and sufferings might not have 
wholly estranged his heart from his country, and 
whether his fanaticism and pride of prophecy might 
not have induced him to collect all the fanatics and 



THE MEDWAY. 171 

malcontents of Kent to aid in the fulfilment of his 
own predictions. Meanwhile the force kept ad- 
vancing in good order and (the nature of the 
ground being considered) with admirable speed. 
As they drew near Will GafFsaid — u I don't know 
his rating or his rig, because d' y' see, master Wal- 
ter, I have never seen him afore ; but I take that 
tall fellow in the black cloak and with that long 
beard at his figure-head to be the Kentish prophet 
men call Tom of the Woods ; and a very terrible- 
looking prophet he is, and very like Death in the 
Revelations — only instead of having the white horse 
under him, he has got it pictured over his head !" 

" That is my friend Tom," said Walter. 

At these words the two peasants, who had been 
holding Walter by the arms, let go their hold, and 
hoped his honour would pardon them for what 
they might have done amiss. Then was heard 
from the advancing line the word " Halt !" pro- 
nounced with that deep and unearthly voice which 
Tom of the Woods and only he possessed : and 
when the line halted, the same deep voice cried to 
the peasants, " Who be ye, and why standing 
here ?" 

The poor bumpkins trembled outright, and 
knew not how to answer ; but Will Gaff, who had 
better knowledge of challenges and practices of 
war, put his right hand to the side of his mouth 
and shouted right manfully, " Friends, for old 
England." 

" Then move and fall into our rear," cried the 
prophet. 

Walter Wynton now stepped forward to meet 
the head of the line, which was again in motion. 
Hatless, and coatless, and mud-stained, and still 



172 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

dripping with the Medway water, as he was, Tom 
of the Woods did not recognise him until he came 
close up to him ; but then Tom gave a cry of 
mixed wonderment and joy ; and after greeting 
the young gentleman most cordially he turned to 
his followers and said, " Now have we a good sea- 
officer with us. This is master Walter Wynton, 
who knows what ships be made of." The people 
shouted, and said that they would have master 
Walter for their leader. As our hero looked at 
the men, and read the countenance of the prophet, 
his doubts and misgivings as to their intention 
were ended. There was not a thin fanatic or sour- 
faced malignant among them ; they seemed to be 
composed in good part of hearty Kentish farmers 
and small freeholders, and of their well-conditioned 
farm-servants ; and as for Tom, he seemed wholly 
changed. The truth was that the soldier part of 
his character and his latent patriotism had com- 
pletely subdued the fanatical part of it. The ranter 
and prophet had entirely disappeared with the 
news that his country was invaded, and he stood 
on those Kentish hills a warrior and patriot, with 
no other thought than how to beat back the in- 
solent foe, and avenge the disgrace his country had 
sustained. His tongue had forgotten the language 
of the conventicle — that mad phraseology which 
had so turned his brain ; he had left his book and 
his hermit's staff behind him in the woods, and now 
he carried a good sword of the Ironside fashion in 
his right hand and pistols in his girdle, and, instead 
of speaking of vials of heavenly wrath and of 
visitations and judgments, he spoke of cannon and 
battles, of the primary duty of all Englishmen to 
stand for their country, and beat the Dutch before 



THE MEDWAY. 173 

any man among them, of whatsoever party in 
politics or religion, gave another thought to what 
might be amiss in church or state. 

A few hurried, explanations were given to 
Walter. Tom, suspecting where the great blow 
would be struck, and knowing the distractions of 
the government, the shameful corruption and neg- 
ligence of its officers, and the indefensible state in 
which that district had been left, had thrown him- 
self among the free and stout-hearted farmers and 
freeholders dwelling on the broad promontory 
which divides the Thames from the Med way, and 
had easily made them take up arms for the defence 
of their own shores, and place themselves under 
his leading. Every pike, spear, match-lock, mus- 
ket, or fowling-piece in the district had been put 
in requisition ; and the supply had been found so 
abundant, that out of four or five hundred men 
only a few were armed with scythes, bill-hooks, 
and such like tools. ' At Cowling Castle (once the 
property and abode of the renowned Sir John Old- 
castle, the head of the Wycliffites in the days of 
Henry IV., who was the first martyr, and the first 
author among the nobility of England, and who 
was barbarously put to death upon the statutes 
of treason and de hereiico comburendd) they had 
found a few old brass guns ; and in some other places 
nearer the water they had furnished themselves 
with a few old ship guns, and with a considerable 
quantity of powder and suitable ball. A few sailors 
had joined them, and after explaining the confu- 
sion which prevailed in the upper part of the river, 
and especially at Upnor Castle, together with the 
faults of construction, and the other causes which 
would render the fire of that castle so very useless 

I 



174 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

a waste of powder and shot, these mariners had 
recommended the construction of a battery on the 
bank below Hoo, where, on account of sand-banks 
and shallows, the Dutch would be obliged to sail 
very close to shore. 

As Tom of the Woods finished these explana- 
tions, Walter said to him, " By my life, your whole 
plan is a good one, and I will do my best to help 
in the execution of it. I could not but think, even 
when those poor clowns held me in their grip as a 
Dutchman or traitor, that somewhere in this quarter 
a few well-served guns might do much." 

" Aye," said Will Gaff, with a right merry 
grin, " a few good shot between wind and water ! 

I see And I have seen a big 

Dutchman go down that way aforetime. That old 
Dutch skipper is a gentleman, and behaved as such 
to master Walter ; but d — n me double if I don't 
have a rap at his sheathings. for the sake of Joel 
Wyke, and the other rantingv psalm-singing Eng- 
lish scoundrels that be on board." 

Instead of reproving him for swearing, Tom of 
the Woods swore himself, saying to Will Gaff, 
" By the Lord, so you shall ! and mind you take 
good aim." 

" I '11 take better aim than Joel took at my poor 
skull while I was in the water," said Will, with 
another very pleasant grin. 

It was not until all these explanations had been 
given, and the march of the hermit's little army 
had been resumed, that Walter's patriotism allowed 
him to speak of more private matters, near as some 
of those matters were to his heart's core. He then 
questioned Tom of the Woods, and learned from 
him that his father at Charlton, and the family at 



THE MED WAY. 175 

Erith, had been duly informed of the duel and 
catastrophe which had made Walter a fugitive, 
and sent the good knight's bay mare and the young 
gentleman's black horse scampering into Erith 
without any riders upon their backs, and with their 
reins broken and the furniture all torn — a sight 
which had rilled the kind heart of the old knight 
and the loving heart of maid Marion with dismay 
and grief. Of Faittout, or the body of Sir Ralph 
Spicer, or of 'any proclamation by government or 
by sheriff, Tom knew nothing ; for, since his part- 
ing with Walter, and the dispatching of his trusty 
messenger to Captain Wynton at Charlton, he had 
kept a good way to the eastward of Lessness Heath 
and Plumstead Common, and during the last three 
days he, as well as all the men of Kent, had been 
too busy to hear or think of any such matters. 
Tom had, however, heard in the course of the pre- 
ceding day that the family had quitted Erith : he 
did not know whither Marion and my lady were 
gone, but Sir John Roundtree had been met on 
horseback with his warlike harness on, and with a 
good company of armed yeomen at his back, crossing 
Gad's hill, on his way to Chatham. 

" And thither, or to some other post or place of 
danger, will my brave father have betaken himself, 
if he but alive and able to move from his bed," 
said Walter. "If he and Sir John should but 
meet where bullets and balls be flying about, they 
will be friends for the rest of their lives. Yet 
would I could know where Marion is ! The times 
are dangerous, and Lady Roundtree, to say the 
least, lacketh discretion." 

, But busy occupation drove away for the time 

I 2 



176 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

these anxious thoughts. They had now reached 
the river bank, and after gazing for a short while 
at the fire and smoke which now seemed to cover[the 
whole of the Medway from Muscle Bank to Upnor 
Castle, these true-hearted men of Kent, under the 
guidance of Walter and Tom of the "Woods, began to 
mark out a battery, and to dig a broad deep ditch. 
As they worked might and main, a number of 
peasants came and joined them from Stoke, and 
from other villages. Women and children, and 
tottering old men, came flocking to Hoo, and to 
the river bank beneath, bringing spades and mat- 
tocks, and meat and drink, and then lending their 
hands to the digging : — 

" The oldest and youngest 
Are at work with the strongest." 

With all this heart put into it, the labour advanced 
rapidly ; and as they toiled, the brave yeomen of 
fruitful Kent sang in merry chorus the ballad 
which recited how their ancestors had stood in 
arms against William the Conqueror until he 
granted them the laws of good King Edward, and 
all their ancient customs, liberties, and privileges : 
and albeit the ballad was but homely (being the 
composition of " the ballading silk - weaver/' 
Thomas Deloney, who lived in the days of Eliza- 
beth and King James), yet was there poetry and a 
lyrical grandeur in it, when four hundred manly 
voices chanted — 

" Let us not live like bondmen poor to foemen in their 

pride, 

But keep our ancient liberty, what chance soe'er betide : 

And rather die in bloody field, in manlike courage prest, 

Than to endure the servile yoke which we so much detest." 



THE MED WAY. 177 

Thus did the Kentish commons cry unto their leaders still, 
And so marched forth in warlike sort and stood on 

Swanscombe hill, 
Where in the woods they hid themselves under the shady 

green, 
Thereby to get them vantage good, of all their foes 

unseen. 

And for the conqueror's coming there, they privily laid 

wait, 
And thereby suddenly appalled his lofty high conceit. 

u God send we may do as much by the Dutch," 
said "Will Gaff. " We have no green wood here, 
but we have a snug covering of rushes and brush- 
wood ; and if some spy do not prate, we shall take 
Mynheer by surprise as we rattle into the bows of 
the first ship that comes up". . . . " Or that goes 
down," said Walter ; " for our battery cannot be 
ready until to-morrow, and we must not throw 
away powder and shot, or let them know where we 
be until we can make the report with good effect. 
They may not come further this tide, for it is turn- 
ing, and they will not try by night." 

" Not they !" said Will. 



( 178 ) 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 

After witnessing the easy destruction of his boom 
and chain, Monk was put to his wits' end. Like 
all the rest, he blamed everybody but himself. He, 
however, remained on the Med way instead of re- 
pairing to London, to which he was hastily sum- 
moned by the court. He sent up hurried and 
evidently confused orders to the governor of Upnor 
Castle, who, instead of artillery-men, had no force 
with him except some cavalry. In the evening 
my lord general, being followed by nearly all the 
land troops, rode back to Chatham to see to the 
means of defending the dockyard and the ships that 
lay in that part of the river. In order to screen 
himself, he may, in the well-known letter which 
he did not give in until some months after the 
events, have exaggerated the faults of others ; yet 
is there no good ground for doubting that all things 
at Chatham were in a disgraceful state of disor- 
ganization and confusion, and that nearly every 
servant of government was thinking rather of him- 
self than of his country. Monk wanted carpenters 
and good oak or ship -timber, wherewith to make 
bulwarks for batteries intended for the defence of 
the yard ; but in the yard he could find only two 
carpenters, and they were running away ; and in- 
stead of oak the commissioners sent him deal planks. 
But what he wanted most of all was a supply of 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 179 

boats and barges — and this was not to be procured. 
Under this disjointed and corrupt government 
everything connected with the service had become 
disjointed, and nearly every man in the service cor- 
rupt and base to the lowest pitch of baseness. The 
officers specially charged with these duties, instead 
of attending to them, had attended and were actu- 
ally attending to nothing save their own private 
interests ; and while some of them were withhold- 
ing the materials of war, others were busily engaged 
in removing their own household furniture and 
other property in the government boats up the river 
to Maidstone, or to some nearer yet safe place above 
Rochester bridge. Nearly every boat and barge 
was thus employed by the officers and officials. 
Execrably as all things had been managed, not one 
of our ships in the upper part of the river would 
have been taken and burned, if the boats and 
barges had been where they ought to have been. 
But they were nearly all above bridge ; and there 
they continued the next day when most wanted. 
Monk got a few working men together, and stayed 
all night in Chatham yard ; but, having no money 
wherewith to pay the men, all that he could do or 
say could not put a proper spirit in them. The 
shipwrights, like the sailors, were starving. Such 
little work as was well done appears to have been 
done entirely by volunteers — by right-hearted 
Kentish men, who came in from the neighbouring 
towns and villages, and many of them from places 
further off than that pretty and safe town of Maid- 
stone, to which our fighting men were sending off 
their goods. 

In the course of the night Monk got some Mtj 
cannon planted in different places, but the sites of 



180 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

his batteries appear to have been badly chosen, and 
they were certainly all very badly supplied. Before 
morning my lord general most idly flattered him- 
self that he had at the least put Upnor Castle " in 
a pretty condition of defence." Piteous and most 
deplorable was the plight of England when her 
fleet was thus put under the control of land-gene- 
rals and colonels of regiments ; when her ships 
were thus made to skulk behind miserable land- 
batteries, and to seek protection, not from their own 
good broadsides of guns, but from booms of wood 
and chains of iron ! 

On the following morning (Thursday the 13th 
of June) at about ten o'clock, as the tide was rising, 
and the wind blowing right up the river, Yan 
Ghent, who had been lying at anchor near the 
scene of his yesterday's easy triumph, unfurled his 
top-sails, called his men to their guns, and began 
to steer through the shallows for Chatham. As his 
ships got in motion "Will Gafi said, " As ye have 
stayed so long, I wish ye had stayed a little longer, 
for we be not quite ready for ye yet." And, not- 
withstanding the energy of our Kentish yeomen, 
who had been working all the night long under 
the direction of Walter Wynton and Tom of the 
Woods, the battery in Hoo Marsh was indeed not 
quite ready. Our friends, however, comforted 
themselves with thinking that something great must 
have been done by the Duke of Albemarle in the 
course of the night ; that the Dutch who went up 
must come clown again with the returning tide, and 
that then they would have their guns in readiness 
for them, and their battery in such order as to defy 
a land attack, which was the only kind of attack 
that could give them much uneasiness. " Let us lie 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 181 

quiet," said master Walter, "while the enemy- 
passes upwards, for he must not know that we be 
here until we be quite ready for him. His decks 
are crowded with land troops !" And the brave 
Kentish men, who much required rest and time to 
take a little food, suspended their labours and con- 
cealed themselves. 

The Dutch had nothing to do, or had not to fire 
a gun until they came abreast of the pleasant vil- 
lage and cherry -ore hards of Gillingham. Here, 
close to the water's edge, there was an English 
battery which might perchance have made Van 
Ghent repent having ventured so far up ; but alas ! 
there were only four or five bad old guns on the 
spot, and of these only two could be fired, and the 
parapet was so weak that more than half of it fell 
with the first Dutch ball that struck it. A little 
above Gillingham, and on the opposite side of the 
river, there stood (as there now stands) on a little 
slope above the river bank, the small old castle of 
Upnor, which had been built by Queen Elizabeth 
for the protection of Chatham, but which was 
scarcely a better place of arms than the block- 
houses which had been built on various parts of the 
English coast by her father Henry VIII. Upnor 
Castle, too, was injudiciously placed ; and incapable 
of being made of much consequence as a fort ; yet 
the Dutch did not expect to pass it without some 
hard knocks, for they saw a good many great guns 
pointed across the river, which was here very 
narrow. But when this battery began to play upon 
them, its fire excited laughter and derision rather 
than alarm ; for the ball which had been collected 
did not fit the bore of the guns, some of the guns 
were honey- combed, some of their carriages were 

i 3 



182 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

rotten, and only four cannon could be used at al), 
and these so badly loaded as to be of no use. 
Throwing only a few shot to create confusion 
among some militia-men and country-people who 
were standing on the green hillocks near the castle, 
cursing the sight of their country's shame and their 
own insufficiency, Yan Ghent very composedly 
brought his men-of-war to anchor a little above 
Upnor Castle. Of fighting ships he had not brought 
more than five or six, and of these not one was a 
first-rate — indeed two of them would not have been 
a match for one of our ships of the line if she had 
been properly manned and stocked — and we had 
ten or twelve of the largest ships lying between 
Upnor Castle and Rochester bridge. From Sheer- 
ness, Yan Ghent's first starting-point, to Chatham is 
only some twenty miles. The mid-channel of the 
Medway is so deep, the bed so soft, and the reaches 
of the river are so short, that it is the safest har- 
bour in the kingdom. Our great ships were riding 
as in a wet dock, and being moored to chains fixed 
to the bottom of the river, they swung up and 
down with the tide. But all these ships, as well as 
many others of lower rates, were almost entirely 
deserted by their crews, or rather by those few men 
who had been put in them early in the spring, 
rather as watchmen than as sailors ; some were un- 
rigged, some had never been finished, and scarcely 
one of them had either guns or ammunition on 
board, although hurried orders had been sent down 
to equip some of them and to remove others still 
higher up the river out of the reach of danger. 

It was about the hour of noon when Yan Ghent 
let go his anchor just above Upnor Castle. But 
his fire-ships did not come to anchor. No ! sti)l 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 183 

favoured by wind and tide, they proceeded onward, 
and presently fell among our great but defenceless 
ships. The two first of these fire-ships burned 
without any effect, but the rest that went upward 
grappled the ' Great James,' the ' Royal Oak,' and 
the ' Loyal London/ and these three proud ships 
which, under other names, and even under the names 
they now bore, had so often been plumed with 
victory, lay a helpless prey to the enemy, and were 
presently in a blaze. " Had I but had five or six 
boats to cut off the boats of these fire-ships," said 
Monk, " we had prevented the burning of our 
men-of-war I" 

From the dark tower of Rochester Castle to the 
heights behind Chatham, where Fort Pitt now 
stands, and from those heights down to the river, 
and along the river bank as low as Gillingham, 
the ground was almost covered with troops, militia, 
and armed burghers and peasants, who could be 
little more than spectators — indignant spectators, 
but useless in all that concerned the protection of 
our ships. And on the opposite side, the green 
undulating hills between Upnor and Stroud, and the 
northern end of Rochester Bridge, were sprinkled 
with irregular armed bands of all but useless lands- 
men. On either side of the river gaudy cavaliers 
and officers in fine scarlet coats were seen galloping 
to and fro with their drawn swords most idly glit- 
tering in the summer sun ; but we wanted not 
vapouring gallants, but good sea-captains — we 
wanted not horses, but boats — not militia, but 
sailors — not pikes, halberds, pistols, and swords, 
but good ship-guns, and good powder to put into 
them, with ball of the proper calibre. General 
Middleton, who had obtained some reputation as a 



184 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

land-commander, and who had been sent by the 
king to draw all the train -bands of Kent and the 
neighbourhood together, and to take the command 
of all such forces, was storming and cursing, now 
on one side of the river and now on the other ; and 
" my Lord General " and present commander of 
all, Monk, Duke of Albemarle, was here within 
Chatham lines fully persuaded at last that he 
might almost as well be in the moon. 

Having burned to the water's edge the ' London,' 
the i James/ and the ' Royal Oak/ and some few 
other vessels of less note, Van Ghent thought it 
best to take his departure. Yet great as was the 
mischief he had done, it was so easy to have done 
a vast deal more, that the English officers at 
Chatham could scarcely believe their own eyes 
when they saw him prepare to drop down the river 
with the next receding tide, and without making 
any further effort. The young lords who had been 
caracoling with General Middleton or with the 
Duke of Albemarle, now laughed at the Dutch 
and called them cowards ; but the general and the 
duke, as well as every man in his sober senses, 
were glad to see them going, knowing as they did 
but too well, that with but a very little more 
daring and perseverance the enemy would have 
had at their mercy all the remaining shipping, the 
dockyard, and the arsenal, with all that they con- 
tained. Upnor Castle played upon the Dutch 
ships as they began to descend the river ; but the 
fire was as ineffectual as it had been before, and 
the enemy seemed to heed those loose and ill- 
directed cannon-balls no more than if they had been 
so many summer flies. The battery at Gillingham 
was as innocuous as Upnor Castle ; and the Dutch 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 185 

came down with the tide in a long line of single 
ships, the trumpeters on their quarter-decks play- 
ing ' Joan's placket is torn/ ' Loth to depart/ and 
other tunes very insulting and offensive to English 
pride, while the English renegadoes on board kept 
shouting, " Now we are fighting for dollars ! now 
we have gotten change for our tickets ! Go tell 
this at Whitehall." 

By this time AYalter Wynton and Tom of the 
Woods had gotten their rude battery into order. 
Rude it was and irregular enough, but still it was 
capable of firing a few shot for the honour of 
England ; and such good disposition had been 
made as to afford cover and protection to the brave 
volunteers who had formed it. By digging and 
embanking, a tolerable platform had been ob- 
tained, and the mouths of the guns had been 
brought nearly to a level with the surface of the 
water, so near that it might be called a battery 
a fleur de l'eau. It lay low and quite concealed 
among the rushes close to the water, like a wild 
duck's nest. Keeping only the few sailors and a 
few of the yeomen who had been soldiers in former 
days, and who understood something of artillery 
practice, to work the guns, Walter ordered all the 
rest of the company to take post behind a green 
knoll close in the rear of the battery, and there to 
keep themselves both out of sight and out of danger, 
only holding themselves in readiness to sally forth 
and charge if the enemy should attempt a landing. 
On the two flanks the battery was protected by a 
ditch and a strong palisade, the ditches being two 
natural water-courses and running from the two 
opposite sides of the green knoll right into the 
river. But these ditches had been widened and 



186 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

deepened by the unceasing toil of the yeomen ; 
and another ditch had been cut behind the knoll, 
where a brass gun was placed within another stout 
palisade. Walter said to Tom of the Woods and 
Will Gaff, who remained with him in the battery, 
" We be but slightly covered in front, but we lie 
so low, and the Dutch must come so close, that 
their lowest tier of guns will fire over our heads." 

As the foremost Dutch ship approached, sound- 
ing her trumpets in triumph, and apprehending no 
further hindrance or harm, our heroes stood to 
their guns with lighted matches, and when she 
was at the closest to the bank, without any pre- 
ceding shout or cheer they gave fire. Every ball 
told, and hit the ship between wind and water. 
The trumpeters left off trumpeting that there was a 
rent in England's honour, and there was evidently 
astonishment not unmixed with confusion among 
the crew. They could neither recede nor cast 
anchor and stop, for, at that spot there was not 
room enough for the ship to swing ; so they put 
out sweepers and glided past the battery, which 
they could still only see by the smoke of its guns ; 
but before they got out of reach their ship was hit 
again and again, and a gun pointed and fired by 
Walter knocked off her rudder : and then his men 
gave three good cheers. 

The second ship in the retiring line was that 
which contained Joel Wyke and his desperate crew. 
Each gun in the battery was well loaded and 
pointed to give her proper salute in passing ; but 
the cautious old captain, upon hearing the most 
unexpected explosion, and seeing the crippled state 
of the foremost ship,' had hove-to as best he could, 
and was making signals and waiting orders from 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOC 187 

Van Ghent, who was in the rear. The nature of 
the orders he received was soon explained : an 
anchor was let go, and the ship's barge and sundry 
other boats were filled with soldiers and sailors, 
who were presently landed on the river bank, some 
distance above the battery. 

" This is what I expected," said Walter. " They 
mean to dislodge us by a land attack, but they will 
find a hotter reception than they anticipate !" 

" Hang me at a yard-arm," said Will Gaff, " if 
they can make out where we be !" 

There appeared to be truth in what Will said, 
for the smoke of the guns had cleared off, and the 
Dutch officer in command of the land party was 
seen halting on the shingles and peering through 
his prospect-glass. In a minute or two, however, 
the Dutchman put his column in motion along the 
bank. 

" And now," quoth Tom of the Woods, " it is 
my turn, and good time to call out my Kentish 
yeomen." 

Tom quitted the battery, and went up to the 
rear of the green knoll. As he moved along the 
higher ground the enemy caught sight of his tall 
gaunt figure ; and setting up a shout that the men 
in the battery were running away, they began to 
run forward themselves in rather a disorderly 
manner. But before they got within a hundred 
yards of the ditch and palisade, a tremendous 
English shout was heard ; and Tom of the Woods, 
sallying forth with his brave men of Kent, rushed 
between the ditch and the advancing foe, and then, 
leaving a good line in reserve, he threw himself 
upon the Dutch soldiers, who had no time to form. 
It was a close hand-to-hand fight, and soon over. 



188 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. ' 

None fought very desperately on the side of the 
enemy except a band of the English fanatics, at 
whose head was seen Joel Wyke, laying about him 
like one possessed by a demon. At this sight 
Will Gaff could not contain himself : and "so, say- 
ing to Walter that he would be back anon to work 
his gun, but that he must go and settle old scores 
with Joel, he sprung out of the battery and over 
ditch and palisade ; and in little more time than it 
takes to say it, he confronted the terrible sea- 
lawyer and divine, who was cutting his way to- 
wards the ditch, and shouting to the madmen that 
pressed after him that he was invulnerable, and 
that King Jesus would protect his own. As soon 
as he saw Will GafF he gnashed his teeth, and 
sprung towards him, shouting " Ha! backslider! 
Perish, thou Philistine." 

" I'll see you perish first," said Will, parrying 
his furious blow, and then cutting him across the 
pate with so deadly a stroke that Joel turned up 
the white of his eye, and reeled and fell at GaiFs 
feet, which he tried to bite through the strong 
leather shoes that were on them. 

" Thou wast ever a bitter biter and venomous 
in thy nature," said Will, bestowing a good kick 
upon the prostrate fanatic ; u but 'tis all over with 
thee now ! so let bygones be bygones, and may 
God forgive thee thy sin against thy country, and 
that cowardly shot thou didst fire at me." 

As soon as they saw the fall of the great and 
invulnerable Joel, the English fanatics took to 
their heels and joined the Dutch in running back 
to the boats. The bold men of Kent pursued them 
with pike and sword in their loins, and as Will GafF 
found his hand in for cutlass exercise ; he went with 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 189 

the men of Kent. The Dutch man-of-war, which 
saw nearly the whole of this very rapidly moving- 
scene, could not use her guns, as the contending 
parties were so mixed together ; but she sent off one 
or two more boats filled with soldiers to eover the 
retreat, and bring off the thoroughly defeated land 
party, who rushed neck-deep into the water to 
meet them or to get into their own boats. As 
Tom of the Woods saw that the fugitives had had 
enough of their experiment, and that the Dutch 
captain had no intention of repeating it, he with- 
drew his force and his wounded prisoners. At this 
moment Tom's appearance was more than usually 
awful, for he had been foremost in the fighting, 
and his long grey beard was stained and dripping 
with blood — with blood from his own veins as well 
as from those of the foe, for Tom was no more 
invulnerable than was Joel Wyke, and besides re- 
ceiving sundry scratches from steel, he had been 
hit by a ball. 

As Will Gaff came to the spot where he had 
left his old and mortal foe Joel, he stopped to see 
whether his pangs were over. The Fifth-Monarchy 
man still breathed, and as Will bent over him he 
opened wide his eyes, raised himself on his elbow, 
and seemed so full of life, that poor Will thought 
it was just possible he might recover from the 
effects of the gash he had given him ; and as his 
own animosity had completely evaporated, and as 
certain commandments and sacred injunctions 
flitted through his mind, he said, " Shipmate, what 
cheer ? Canst rise, man ? Shall I tie up thy brow 
and carry thee on my shoulders into the battery ?" 

Looking savagely at him, Joel said in a horrible 
husky tone and with apparent difficulty, as if he 



190 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

were choking — " Never to the accursed Prelatists ! 
No, not to be hanged like Venner ! . . . But water, 
one drop of water V s 

Although the distant Dutchmen had brought some 
of their guns to bear upon the bank, and balls were 
flying rather thickly about, Will Gaff ran to a 
little runnel near the ditch, filled his leather cap 
with water, and ran back with it to the dying man. 

" There Joel, drink," said he, " and when thou 
art refreshed let me remove thee." 

Joel drank of the water, and then dashing away the 
cap and the honest hand that held it, he exclaimed 
in a clearer voice, " My next remove is to the 
mansion of the saints. Backslider and sinner that 
thou art, I am bound for Heaven !" 

" Then," quoth Will, " while that blue-peter is 
flying, forgive and t forget, and just shake hands 
with an old messmate ! And do just say before 
thou goest, i God bless old England.' " 

Gaff held out his right hand : Joel grasped it, 
but not in friendship or forgiveness. — No ! he 
carried that honest kind right hand to his ghastly, 
white, and quivering mouth, and tried to set his 
teeth in it. 

" Shiver my hulk !" said Will, when he had 
withdrawn his hand from this unloving embrace, 
" shiver me to bits if I have the head to conceive 
such a black heart as thine, O Joel Wyke ! D — n 
me if I would do what thou hast done to the very 
Devil himself!" 

"No," said the fanatic, with a hideous grin, 
Ci the Devil is thy father, and the friend of those 
thou servest. The Devil reisrns in this accursed 

o 

land. 

Will Gaff, thou hast ofttimes thwarted me in 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 191 

my high intents, and this corruptible part of me 
now meets death at thine hand. But Will, it was 
my hand that struck the English colours on board 
the Royal Charles, — it was my hand that set fire 
to the London. — I first lighted the flames that are 
blazing there up the river like the !" 

And, as he said these last words, the fanatic 
turned his heavy blood-shot eyes in the direction 
of Chatham, and so, gazing on the conflagration 
and ruin, he gave up the ghost. 

Will, who had been repeatedly called in, now 
ran to the battery with a countenance full of 
horror, and a cheek all but as pale as that of the 
dead Joel. Tom of the Woods, who had got his 
wounds bound up, was standing by one of the guns 
washing the blood from his long beard ; and Wal- 
ter, without hat or coat, was labouring to recover 
a gun which had been overset at its last firing. 
At this moment some Kentish gentlemen of note, 
and two or three officers who had been at Upnor 
Castle, and who had heard the inexplicable firing 
of the little battery, and had seen the sudden 
pause and confusion in Yan Ghent's fleet, came 
galloping over the hills to learn what it all meant. 
As they drew rein behind the green knoll, they 
were cheered by the Kentish men. The officers, 
who could not comprehend what they saw, and 
who looked as if they were in a dream, went down 
from the knoll into the battery. There, as they 
gazed upon Tom of the Woods, the tallest and 
most conspicuous figure in the scene, and as Tom 
looked at them with eyes which were rather scorn- 
ful, their amazement increased. As soon as the 
officers could speak they said — " In the name of 



192 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

the King, who are ye ? Who sent ye hither ? Whom 
have ye in command ?" 

:z " In the name of God/' said Tom, holding his 
wet beard in his hand, " we be a few honest men, 
with English hearts in us, who, seeing how badly 
matters were managed by you gentlemen who hold 
commissions, came here without any commission 
at all, except that which the law of Nature gives 
to every man to defend his country." 

" Fellow !" said one of the officers, " thou art 
rough of speech." 

" And rough in deed," said Tom, " when the 
occasion requires it." 

An older and discreeter officer now said, u With 
us there is no need of any roughness : we are come 
to praise, and not to find fault. Ye have done 
your duty like men true and loyal to the King's 
majesty ; ye have done marvellously well ; but we 
would fain know who planned this battery, for the 
King's majesty shall hear of it, and honour and 
reward will be gotten by it." 

" I, for one," said Tom of the Woods, " want 
neither honour nor reward ; but since you must 
know who traced this bit of a work, I tell you that 
it was this worshipful young gentleman that did 
it all." 

Walter, at whom Tom pointed, did not look at 
this moment very like a worshipful young gentle- 
man ; for his clothes and shirt-sleeves were torn and 
covered with dirt and clay, his face was begrimed 
with gunpowder, and his hair was all dishevelled. 

" And may I ask," said the old officer, touching 
his hat with much gravity to Walter, u who is this 
young gentleman ?" 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 193 

" It suits me not to give my name just now," 
said young Wynton ; " but I bear a name which 
the English have heard before to-day — and the 
Dutch too." 

" I think so/' said Will Gaff, who was now 
recovering his natural complexion and good spirits, 
" I think so, i'faith ! and I only wish those Dutch- 
men there in the river knew whose son it is that is 
here to pepper them !" 

The petulant young officer who had first spoken 
said that the leader of the party was bound to 
make his name known. 

" I tell you," said Walter, " I have my private 
and personal reasons for remaining unknown. But 
there is no time for talk. See ! the Dutch are 
again in motion ! I will write my name with 
cannon-ball on the sides of that ship. If you can 
submit to the orders of a young sailor, remain in 
this battery and help us ; but if ye cannot, then 
vouchsafe to depart, for two good commands being 
mixed together are worse than one bad one." 

The officers took the hint and retired behind the 
knoll, where they vainly questioned the Kentish 
yeoman about the tall man with the beard and 
the worshipful young gentleman without coat and 
hat. 

The Dutch, dreading to be left aground by the 
receding tide, had, after some of their habitual 
hesitation, resolved not to land any more men or 
make any further attempt at carrying the battery, 
but to drop down with the current and get out of 
reach as quickly as possible. And they now came 
down in close line, without any insolent trumpet- 
ings. Each ship as it passed presented her broad- 
side so near to the battery that every gun fired by 



194 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

Walter and his friends had a smashing effect on her 
sheathings ; but not one of the many guns dis- 
charged by the Dutch did the least harm on shore, 
for they were too near to the bank and in much too 
great a hurry to depress their guns so as to bear 
upon our duck's nest, and all the balls and bullets 
flew high overhead, hitting the green knoll, or 
lodging in a long bank of clay. With a few more 
guns of greater calibre than those he had, Walter 
would have sunk more than one of those Dutchmen 
under Hoo. As it was, he did Yan Ghent's flotilla 
no small hurt ; and it was mainly through the 
firing of his improvised battery, and the delay it 
had caused (which made the enemy lose much of the 
benefit of the tide), that before they could reach 
Sheerness one of their ships went down and two 
were run ashore and burned. The last shot and 
the last charges of powder in the battery were fired 
at the hindmost ship — a laggard fire-ship which 
had been afraid to run the gauntlet, and which 
blew up off Oakham-Ness before she got out of sight. 
When lower down the river the Dutch found 
themselves obliged to set fire to some prizes which 
they had intended to carry off; but they were fully 
determined to take the ' Royal Charles ' with them, 
both as a trophy of their victory and as one of the 
finest war-ships then in existence. To accomplish 
this end they threw some of her masts and guns 
overboard, and heeled her on one side to make her 
draw less water ; for the tide was running rapidly 
out, and in several places would not have left water 
enough to float that beautiful leviathan. All this 
was performed with much coolness and seamanlike 
skill ; and the ' Royal Charles ' was brought down 
during a state of tide and wind in which it was 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 19*5 

said the best pilot in Chatham would not have un- 
dertaken it. But it is not improbable that in this 
sad season of disaffection and treachery one of the 
best of English pilots was serving the Dutch on 
board that ship. 

Long before the fort gave its last fire a great 
many more gentlemen and officers came to the 
spot from either side of the river, and a multi- 
tude of people arrived and continued to arrive 
at the only place where honour had been done to 
the English flag. The people were full of enthu- 
siasm, and many of the gentlemen as they rode up 
were eager to know and see the heroes of the day. 
But the last shot of all had no sooner been fired 
than "Walter, and Tom of the Woods, and brave 
Will Gaff called round them the yeomen and pea- 
sants whom Tom had raised and brought with him, 
and began to move off inland in the direction of 
Cowling Castle. The people rent the air with 
their shouts, and called upon them to tarry and 
show themselves, and allow themselves to be car- 
ried in triumph to my Lord General at Chatham ; 
a good many Kentish gentlemen rode after them ; 
and a general officer, whose noble appearance im- 
posed respect, rode up to the dense irregular pha- 
lanx, and begged, as an Englishman and a lover of 
his country, that he might have sight and speech of 
the true Englishmen who had done so manfully. 
Walter felt much inclined to come out from the 
throng which hedged him round, explain his name 
and condition, and the affair of Plumstead Common, 
and surrender himself to the general; but Tom 
strongly dissuaded him from this course, urging 
him not to put trust in princes and courtiers, and 
declaring that he would neither surrender with him 



196 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

nor allow him to give himself up without some sure 
amnesty for the death of Sir Ealph Spicer ; and 
poor Tom, whose head was again wandering into 
some of its old tracts now that the excitement was 
over, looked so, wan and faint through loss of blood, 
that Walter could not find it in his heart to quit 
him, or to grieve him by attempting it. 

" Well, Tom," said he, " it shall be as thou 
wilt. Where thou goest I will go, and the same 
amnesty shall hold thy name and mine together." 

All this while they had kept moving rapidly off, 
and they were now ascending the gentle acclivity 
of the hill on which Walter and Tom had met on 
the preceding day. The general officer still rode 
after them, repeating his requests in earnest, but 
most courteous terms. 

" Tom," said Walter, " I would fain say some- 
what to satisfy that gentleman.' ' 

w I will do it presently," said Tom, "for I do 
see that all the rest of the red-coats with that jack- 
anapes that came into the battery are going back 
again. It would not marvel me if some of them 
went to Monk and claimed the credit of that little 
exploit which the Lord hath enabled us to per- 
form." 

On the ridge of the hill, Tom cried halt ! and 
standing up in the midst of the honest Kentish men, 
his grim visage showing itself high above most of 
their heads, he turned to the general and said, " I 
was once one of the Ironsides and fought for Oliver 
as long as my conscience permitted me so to do ; 
I am now Tom of the Woods, the Kentish prophet 
— or Bedlamite if you will. I am Tom of the 
Woods that has lived in woods and wilds this many 
a-year, doing harm to none, but only raising my 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 197 

voice against the sins of the times. I am poor 
Tom that hath been hunted about the land, and 
gyved and imprisoned — nay, that hath been scourged 
by hangman's hands. But not scourging could whip 
out of me my English heart, or make me forget 
that I am native to this soil, and that this earth 
holds the bones of my kindred and forefathers. I 
predicted a great calamity without knowing what 
it would be ; but when the shame and danger fell 
upon the land, I could not help doing my best to 
avert the blow. Warrants in the king's name have 
been issued to apprehend me ; but I came down 
hither and brought with me these brave men of 
Kent, and such artillery and munition as we could 
find in this corner of the island. Some of these 
things we did forcibly ; but the guns, together with 
a few prisoners, will all be found down there in the 
battery, and as for the powder and shot, they have 
been spent in the way you wot of, and it is reasonable 
to hope that we shall not be called to account on 
that score. Yet all I did and got others to do 
might, perchance, have been of little avail but for 
this gallant young gentleman that stands here by 
my side, and who, for reasons of his own, would for 
the present remain unknown." 

The old officer could distinguish the still hatless 
and coatless Walter in the crowd, and some of the 
Kentish gentlemen who had ridden up the hill fixed 
their eyes on the same object. These worthies 
were chiefly from other parts of the county ; but 
there was one who had his habitation not far from 
Charlton, and as he looked at Walter's face, he re- 
cognised him in spite of the gunpowder and smoke 
which had so begrimed it. As this gentleman, 
however, before quitting his home, had heard some 

K 



198 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

flying report about a duello with a great courtier 
on Plumstead Common, he thought it best to say- 
nothing ; but he resolved as soon as the opportunity 
should offer to inform Captain Wynton of the con- 
dition and doings of his fugitive son, and to bear 
testimony to Walter's skill and gallantry, and to 
the effect produced on the Dutch by his little 
battery. 

In the meanwhile the old officer had been almost 
as much puzzled with the appearance of Walter as 
he had previously been with that of Tom of the 
Woods; but, being a generous-hearted man, he 
forebore to question them any further, and then 
praised them and thanked them, and bade God 
speed them. 

" Others," said he, " may try to rob you of the 
honour which is your due : but I will speak to the 
truth in court and in council, and in the par- 
liament, if need be, whenever parliament shall be 
assembled. Remember m^ name — General Hil- 
borough." 

And so saying, the old officer courteously waved 
his hand and rode back towards the battery. The 
Kentish gentlemen who had followed thus far also 
departed ; and then the good yeomen continued 
their march. In a short time Tom, although he 
uttered not a word of complaint, showed by his 
looks and motions that he was suffering agony from 
the gun-shot wound, and in a few minutes more he 
became so faint that it was found necessary to 
carry him. The country between Cowling Castle 
and High Halstow, in the centre of the promontory, 
or about midway between the two rivers of Thames 
and Medway, was almost covered with the goods 
and cattle of those who had fled from the banks of 



THE BATTERY UNDER HOO. 199 

the Thames, and with parties of women and chil- 
dren who had bivouacked there, and who had heard 
all day long the dreadful firing in the Med way. 
There were tender greetings, and overflowing joys 
expressed by silent tears, when our returning 
Kentish men met their wives and children on this 
spot. Every loving wife among them had thought 
that her own husband at least must perish ; but here 
they were all back, husbands, brothers, and sons, 
and no one killed, and scarcely six slightly wounded 
anions: them all ! 

An honest farmer offered in his snug homestead 
a secure asylum to Tom of the Woods and master 
"Walter ; and the yeomen and peasants separated, 
after they had pledged themselves to protect the 
two strangers at the cost of their lives, and to meet 
again in arms whenever Tom or Walter should 
call upon them. 

Will Gaff, with something very like a big tear 
in his eye, was scraping his starboard foot, and 
taking his leave of Walter in sailor-fashion ; but 
the young gentleman said, " No, no, Will, thou 
must not leave us yet ;" and so Gaff stayed, and 
was well lodged in a clean and sweet hayloft, and 
surpassingly well entertained with meat and drink. 

The hundred of Hoo and the neighbouring hun- 
dred of Shamel, which yet retain a good deal of 
their primitive character, were very quaint, curious, 
and interesting districts in the middle of the seven- 
teenth century. The manors, the hamlets, and 
townships, as High Halstow, Beluncle, St. Mary, 
Malmains, Allhallows, Offerland, Tudors, Stoke, 
Cowling, Chaddington, Cliff, Hailing, Cookstone, 
Shorne Green, Gad's Hill, Horn's Place, and the 
like (in nearly all of which Tom of the Woods had 

k 2 



200 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

recruited), were all places of great antiquity ; and 
although not many old buildings, with the excep- 
tion of the churches, were left, generation after 
generation had built their farm-houses and cottages 
on the sites where the Saxons had built in the times 
of the Heptarchy, and the farmers and peasants 
still seemed, in manners as well as in aspect, an 
unmixed Saxon race. The country abounded in 
Shaksperean names. At the call of Tom, a good 
score of Bardolphs and as many Poinses, a good 
many Petos and not a few Nyms, had rallied round 
the ancient banner of Kent. Most of the manors 
had belonged in the olden time to the cathedral, 
the bishops, and monks of Eochester, by virtue of 
donations and charters from the Saxon kings of 
Kent, or from the kings of England of the Norman 
line. The last lay lord of Hoo was Sir Edward 
Hales, who, having risked his life and his fortune 
in the service of King Charles I., and contracted 
enormous debts, had been obliged to abandon his 
manors in Hoo and his country as well, to neither 
of which he ever returned. There was not a gen- 
tleman's house, inhabited, nor one resident clergy- 
man in the whole hundred of Hoo (the clergy 
living in Stroud or Eochester or elsewhere) ; but 
the yeomen, who held their lands by the ancient 
Kentish tenure of Gavelkind, were noted for their 
substance, hospitality, and wealth. The district 
was rarely visited by the stranger ; and although it 
was so near to Chatham, the sight of an officer or 
any servant of government was so uncommon and 
distasteful, that the mischievous little boys generally 
pelted such visitant with Hoo mud. 



( 201 ) 
CHAPTER X. 

MISTRESS MARION IX LONDON. 

When the people of Erith, on the morning of the 
10th, were all packing up their goods and chattels, 
and preparing to run away from the Dutch in the 
Thames — to run they knew not whither — and when 
the Dutch guns were heard roaring and rattling 
close to Gravesencl, Sir John Round tree had 
thought it time to look to the safety of his woman- 
kind ; but as for his goods and chattels he scarcely 
bestowed a single thought upon them, and if some 
of the family plate and valuables were removed, 
it was owing to the caution and consideration of 
her ladyship and Roger Hinde the old butler. 

" I will put on harness once more,'' said the 
good knight ; u and as soon as I have placed the 
women out of the reach of immediate danger, I 
will go whithersoever true English hearts be most 
wanted.''' 

The ladies were soon ready, for her ladyship was 
doubly hurried by fear of the Dutch cannon and 
by joy at the thought of seeing the great city once 
more, Sir John upon reflection having concluded 
that London after all would be the securest place, 
and that Mr. Samuel Pepys, her ladyship's very 
dear friend, would be the wariest and most know- 
ing protector he could find for the ladies during 
his own absence. There was an old family coach 
in the stable-yard — for most men of knightly de- 



202 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

gree had their coaches at this time, albeit they 
were often drawn by the same horses which 
ploughed their lands ; but Sir John, who liked the 
old Elizabethan style in all things, had an antipa- 
thy to coaches, and his clumsy vehicle had never 
been mended since the Christmas which followed 
the restoration of King Charles, when his coach- 
man, getting surpassingly drunk at a gentleman's 
house where our knight had been dining, — it was 
the custom of those hospitable times to ply the 
servants of every visitor with strong drink, — drove 
into some deep ruts on Lessness Heath, and upset 
the said vehicle with a mighty smash. Since his 
second marriage he had ofttimes been worried by 
her ladyship about the coach ; but as Marion had 
always preferred the saddle, he had invariably said 
that he would see about it some day or other. 
There thus being no coach, her ladyship was 
mounted on a pillion behind the old butler, her 
waiting-woman was mounted behind one of the 
grooms, and Marion's maid Lucy was mounted in 
the same manner behind another man-servant. 
Marion being a good equestrian, rode her own 
cantering jennet ; and the knight bestrode his favo- 
rite bay mare, with pistols in holster, and his good 
old sword by his side, — that ancestral Spanish 
blade which in its time had done service for Queen 
Elizabeth. And as the party ambled across Less- 
ness Heath — her ladyship and the two hand- 
maidens bumping a little upon their pillions, and 
holding fast to the girdles of the men that rode 
in the saddles before them — Sir John was so 
pleased at the now somewhat oldfashioned sight, 
that he left off thinking about the Dutch, whose 
guns were still heard roaring in his rear, and 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 203 

whistled a tune of the Shaksperean age. They 
passed the Abbey Wood and the ruins of Lessness 
Abbey, then a picturesque object, covered with 
ivy, and in the midst of trees, but of which the 
destructive barbarism of succeeding generations 
has not left the least vestige. As they rode through 
the pleasant village of Charlton, her ladyship pro- 
posed that they should stop and take a refection 
with her wealthy and much esteemed friend Sir 
William Ducie. Now our knight liked not the 
man, nor even the sight of the fine old house he 
occupied, for Charlton Place had belonged to his 
near friend and companion in arms, Sir Henry 
Newton (son to Sir Adam Newton, tutor to Prince 
Henry, who had built the house in the days of 
James I.) ; and this devoted royalist had so ex- 
hausted his fortune during the civil war, and had 
met with so bad a return since the present king's 
restoration, that he had been obliged to sell Charl- 
ton to this Sir William Ducie, who was but a 
novus homo, and the second son of a trading Lon- 
don alderman. 

" Please you, my lady," said Sir John touching 
the flank of his bay mare with the spur, and riding- 
foremost, " I would rather draw rein at the house 
of public entertainment at the other side of Black- 
heath, for there is an air about this place which 
strikes cold to my heart." 

And so the party rode on, leaving the red-brick 
tower of the church and the picturesque mansion 
and the magnificent old cypress- trees, which then 
stood in front of the house, behind them. Had 
they stayed at Charlton Place a discovery would 
have been made which would have spared Sir John 
much uneasiness and Marion much unhappiness. 



204 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

There was another house by that village where 
Marion would fain have tarried, and the sight of 
which had shot both hot and cold to her young 
heart : — it was the house of Captain Wynton, the 
birthplace and home of the now fugitive Walter. 

After a short rest at Blackheath, our travellers 
rode through Greenwich. They were now mixed 
with many other families, who were running from 
various parts of the Kentish side of the river to 
seek shelter in the capital. They saw many dismal 
sights on the road and in the narrow dirty streets 
of the Borough, and they heard not a few offensive 
words addressed to themselves by the alarmed and 
tumultuous people ; but they came to the end of 
London Bridge without any injury or accident, and 
got safely through that narrow and perilous pass. 
The houses and shops which then stood on either side 
of the old bridge seemed all to be stripped of their 
goods, and deserted by their occupants. On the 
city side of the bridge they found the lord mayor 
and aldermen in their formalities making procla- 
mation by sound of trumpet, and a number of 
hungry-looking sailors listening to the cryer with 
their hands in their pockets. Midway down the 
Minories — a street which was not then occupied 
by slopsellers and old clothesmen — there was a 
reputable house of entertainment, or a sort of 
family hotel, which Sir John had frequented in 
bygone days. As the house was still in the hands 
of the same host and hostess, and as it stood so 
conveniently near to Seething-lane and the residence 
of that adroit man Samuel Pepys, Sir John deter- 
mined to leave his family here. He said to himself, 
" There will be less danger to the women from 
rioting sailors than from west-end profligates — 



MISTRESS MARION US LONDON. 205 

besides, they cannot do without the councils and 
services of Pepys and his wife — and there is another 
reason besides, and that is, that I have no acquaint- 
ance with any other host or hostess, or with any 
other reputable house in London, so that if I don't 
leave them here, I know not where I can leave 
them. My Kentish hinds know no more of the 
great city and its ways than so many babes. But 
here Pepys will have an eye upon them — and 
Samuel Pepys is such a knowing man and so ready 
to do a service to a friend, particularly when he 
knows that he will not lose by it." 

At our knight's first summons, the Clerk of the 
Acts, who was at the Navy-office close by, put on 
his beaver, and came running to the hostel. Lord ! 
the ecstasies he was in to see them all ! He would 
go fetch his wife, and she would be as glad as he, 
and there was nothing between earth and heaven 
but they would do for Lady Roundtree and sweet 
mistress Marion. The knight might rely on their 
care, — he, Samuel Pepys, knew how to act cautiously 
in difficult times — the knight might count upon 
that — and he knew town and its ways and by- 
ways, and Sir John might rely upon that also. He 
would be as watchful as a lynx, as sry as a fox. 
Indeed, since the beginning of these present troubles 
he had never slept with more than one eye at a 
time. He had powerful friends and supporters in 
the city, and, though he said it himself, great 
friends at the other end of town. " I have friends," 
said he, in our knight's ear, u I have friends even 
among the fanatics ; and as for our tumultuous 
sailors, why they' do know that the Clerk of the 
Acts, albeit he hath not been able to do much for 

k3 



206 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

them, hath been a better friend to them than any 
other man in the Navy-office." 

When Sir John led the clerk to speak of public 
matters, he found from that official and very suf- 
ficient authority that the state of the navy and the 
temper of the mariners of England were even worse 
than he had thought ; he learned that no proper 
preparations had been made anywhere ; that all 
things in or connected with the government were 
disjointed ; and that serious apprehensions were 
entertained that Louis XI V., though testifying a 
desire to accommodate differences, and to act as 
mediator between the English and the Dutch, 
would play us false, and invade our country with a 
great army he had collected at Dunkirk. 

" But, whither away so soon, Sir John ?" said 
Pepys, as our true-hearted knight called up his 
groom and bade him saddle his bay mare if she had 
eaten her corn, and get his own nag ready to follow 
him back. 

Said Sir John — " Now that my womankind are 
safe, I will go see what can be done among my 
Kentish neighbours, and will then ride over to the 
Medway, for it is there that de Ruyter will be 
most dangerous." 

And without allowing himself time to rest, and 
without attending to some very prudent advice 
which Pepys began to give him, the old knight 
mounted and departed, not without some tears 
being shed by mistress Marion, and by Lady 
Roundtree, who thought it very silly in her husband 
to go in search of danger when he might abide 
quietly in London, where so many great officers who 
were paid for fighting were enjoying their usual 
pleasures. 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 207 

Her ladyship, however, was delighted to be once 
more in the great city, and enraptured at the visit 
of Mrs. Pepys, who discoursed about the court 
ladies and gallants, and the last new fashion in 
dress which the Castlemaine had introduced, and 
of playhouses and the last new play, and of the gay 
doings they would have as soon as these troubles 
should be over. But in the course of that even- 
ing and night Lady Round tree was considerably 
alarmed by cries in the streets, and rumours of 
gatherings upon Tower-hill, ^vhere the sailors' 
wives and other ^Yapping women were screaming — 
" This comes of your not paying our husbands ! 
This comes of your starving out our Joes ! So now 
your work is undone or done by hands that under- 
stand it not." And other persons, of better con- 
dition, were heard saying in the open streets, that 
the nation was bought and sold, and betrayed by 
the Papists and others about the King ; and that the 
next news to expect was that the French army from 
Dunkirk had landed on the coast of Kent. 

On the next night matters looked still worse, for 
it was then known that the Dutch had taken Sheer- 
ness, and had landed troops there. All the night 
long the drums beat through the city of London 
and the Tower Hamlets ; and proclamation was 
made in every street that every man belonging to 
the train-bands must, upon pain of death, ap- 
pear in arms on the morrow morning, with 
bullet and powder, and money to supply him- 
self with provisions for a whole fortnight. The 
City artillery company was also called out. These 
corps of armed citizens had been materially changed 
since the first breaking out of the war between 
Charles I. and the parliament, and since the days 



208 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

when that sturdy and devout veteran Major-General 
Skippon commanded them and showed the lustre 
and strength of the metal they were made of, 
and led them from victory to victory, with no 
other harangue than this : " Come, my boys, my 
brave boys, let us pray heartily and fight heartily ! 
I will run the same fortunes and hazards with you. 
Remember the cause is for God, and for the de- 
fence of yourselves, your wives and children ! 
Come, my honest brave boys, pray heartily and 
fight heartily, and God will bless us !" Yet, in 
spite of changes for the worse, the train-bands were 
still tolerably well disciplined, and had a good deal 
of the habit of a military life ; and the day was yet 
distant when the commander of the City artillery 
was to send to the Horse-Guards for a few regular 
soldiers to protect his guns from the suspected in- 
surrection of some of the people. These citizen- 
soldiers got themselves ready, and were full of 
heart ; but after being put on duty they were dis- 
charged, and after being discharged they were 
called out again, and when they had again assem- 
bled in arms the government knew not what work 
to set them to. This greatly increased the trouble 
and distraction of the city. Some cried that the 
King was afraid of employing the bands who had 
fought for liberty and Protestantism against his 
father ; but a louder and more universal cry now 
was " Parliament ! parliament ! Let the King as- 
semble the parliament and save the country !" 
The alarm seemed to increase every hour, and the 
condition of the city was as confused as at the time 
of the Great Fire the year before. Some of the 
wealthier sort would have lodged their valuables in 
the Tower, and some had already deposited their 



MISTRESS MARION IX LONDON. 209 

property there ; but a great court lord, who had 
hitherto tried to pass for one of the greatest sol- 
diers in Europe, and who had the custody of. the 
Tower, after lodging there only one night, declared 
that it was not tenable, and desired to be removed ; 
and thereupon those who had carried their money 
and goods thither thought themselves obliged to 
carry them elsewhere, and so went trooping with 
their horses and pack-horses, and their waggons 
and carriages, along the high north road towards 
Highgate and Finchley, and onward to Barnet and 
Hatfield, and to other places still farther from the 
river. And still the court seemed as mad as ever, 
and to think of nothing but their pleasures after 
they had doubled the guard at Whitehall : and that 
very night the Dutch were burning our ships in 
the Medway, the King and his chosen companions 
supped with my Lady Castlemaine at the Duchess 
of MonmouthV, and there they were all mad in 
hunting a poor moth. But in the course of that 
night the King, who had beenrelying upon the as- 
surances of Monk that his chain and boom across 
the Medway could not be forced, and that the ships 
at Chatham were quite safe, received intelligence 
which made him wake at last from his pleasant 
dream of security, and throw off his habitual in- 
dolence. The next day his Majesty and the Duke 
of York rode into the city, the King being sad 
and almost in tears. The people in the streets, 
rejoicing at the thought that he would now do 
something great, greeted his Majesty as he passed, 
bidding him be of good cheer, and swearing that 
they would all stand by him with their lives. In 
fact the mere appearance of the JKing in the 
situation in which he ought to be at such a crisis, 



210 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

and the sound of the firing of the enemy's guns in 
the river, and the reports that were every hour 
brought in, seemed for the moment to have com- 
pletely dissipated the disaffection and the well- 
grounded discontents of the citizens of London ; to 
have made them all of one mind, which they had 
not been for many a year ; to have destroyed the 
antipathies and hatreds of conflicting sects and 
political parties ; and to have filled them all with 
the determination to rally round the King, as the 
best means of repelling the enemy and retrieving 
the present disgrace. And when Charles made a 
speech to the citizens and the city militia as- 
sembled on Tower-hill, imploring them not to 
desert him and their country at this crisis, unpre- 
cedented as was the disgrace, great as were the 
sums which had been given for carrying on this 
war with vigour, and notorious and visible as were 
the negligence and worse faults of the King and 
Government, and the infamous causes which t had 
brought about all this shame and calamity, not 
one murmur or disrespectful whisper against the 
King was heard to escape from all this vast and 
excited multitude : nor, of all those numbers of 
citizens who had been so often accused of sedition 
and disaffection, and who had not unfrequently 
been severely punished in their purse or in their 
person upon suspicion only, does it appear that any 
one man attempted to make a diversion in favour 
of the enemy, or refused to throw up his cap for 
King and Country. It seemed as though the last 
of the men denationalized by fanaticism had taken 
their departure with Joel Wyke, or had concealed 
themselves in the dark cellars or between the 
double walls of old Hiram Bingley's house in 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 211 

Gravel-lane. Even some few Fifth-Monarchy men, 
who were present at the great meeting on Tower- 
hill, forgot for the nonce Venner and Sir Harry- 
Vane, Harrison and the reign of the Saints, in 
order to think of the best means of beating back 
the Dutch ; and they threw up their caps with the 
rest, and grasping hands they vowed they would 
go forth and do battle against the enemy. The 
people were again one-hearted. Thus, we believe, 
will it ever be with Englishmen when their coun- 
try is invaded, or when an enemy is actually on 
the coast or within our rivers ; but let no govern- 
ment, through corruption, carelessness, indolence, 
or a pertinacity in error, ever bring the country to 
such a pass as this ! Let no government alienate 
the hearts of our seamen, and by neglecting our 
navy, the right hand of our power, find itself 
obliged to trust to popular enthusiasm and to a 
defence by land, to shore batteries and platforms, 
and to the force which ought only to be considered 
as the left hand of our might ! * 

All that day the King and his brother the Duke 
rode up and down the city and suburbs, encou- 
raging the people, and receiving encouragement, 
confidence, and hope from the people. The King 
was serious and earnest, showing that he well knew 
how to attend to business and to do the duties of a 
sovereign and a soldier; yet, it is said, that on 
returning from his visit to the city he laughed at 
the danger and dismay, and was very cheerful that 
night at supper with his mistresses and buffoons — 
which caused some to compare him to Nero sing- 
ing and playing while the city of Home was 
burning. 

On the following day it was rumoured that not 



212 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

only all the train-bands, but also all the regular 
troops in and about London, were to be marched 
forthwith to Rochester and Chatham. Many per- 
sons now conceived that it was the intention of 
government to ruin the city and give it up to be 
utterly undone by the Dutch, and the more timid 
sort were all thrown into fresh consternation. This 
was not confined within the barrier of Temple Bar. 
Alarm, accompanied by a dejection as great as their 
previous pride, sloth, and ignorance, prevailed 
among the ministers, . courtiers, and servants of go- 
vernment ; and those few of them who had any 
property to take care of, were as eager as the 
citizens to get it removed to a distance. The Lords 
of Council were ready to fall together by the ears, 
none knowing which way to turn themselves, and 
every one endeavouring to throw the blame of what 
had happened upon somebody else. There was 
hardly any money in the exchequer ; the commis- 
sioners and officers of the navy were reporting that 
without large sums nothing could be done, and the 
seamen could not be prevented from running to the 
Dutch : there was no chance of obtaining money 
without assembling a parliament, and ministers 
dreaded the parliament as much as the Dutch, 
thinking it impossible but that the vengeance of 
the House of Commons would be directed against 
themselves, and against the scoundrels and fools 
they had put in employment, as soon as it should 
be assembled. 

And what was our friend Mr. Pepys, Clerk of 
the Acts of the Navy, and one of the very best and 
honestest of the public officials connected with the 
navy, doing at this crisis ? Why Pepys was 
thinking that things looked very sadly, and had 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 213 

been managed very badly ; was thanking his stars 
that at this time of danger he was placed at the 
Navy-office in Crutched Friars rather than at the 
Dockyard at Chatham ; and yet was wondering 
how the exasperated people did not set fire to his 
office, and tear him and his colleagues to pieces — 
" for " as he said to himself, " I do think that in 
any nation but ours, men that appear so faulty as 
we would have their throats cut." He was se- 
creting the best of his goods and chattels in his 
snug strong house in Seething-lane ; was removing 
his money from his bankers and goldsmiths ; was 
getting his silver changed into more portable gold ; 
and was hammering his brain to hit upon the safest 
means of sending his father and his wife, and his 
faithful servant William Hewer, off into the country 
with some thousands of pounds in coined gold, 
which they were to bury in the earth in the most 
retired part of the retired tailor's little garden. 
But when Samuel Pepys had seen to his own pri- 
vate interests, and concealed three hundred broad 
pieces in his girdle to have ready in case of emer- 
gency ; and had, with his usual cunning or address, 
taken measures for concealing and securing his 
property and all his money (which he had rapidly 
accumulated by means of official fees, or commission 
or brokerage upon the selling of places, or upon 
government contracts with the navy), he attended 
solely to the duties of his office, and gave his 
country the benefit of ^ome of his ingenuity and 
talent for business. He was active in hiring fire- 
ships, in reasoning with the sailors, and in sending 
off expresses to naval commanders in different 
parts of the kingdom ; and although Samuel did 
make one or two of these couriers carry some 



214 THE DUTCH IN THE MED WAY. 

of his gold into the country for him, and 
drop it in passing at his father's — and although 
it appears doubtful whether he would have de- 
spatched the said couriers at all if it had not 
been for this private object — he soothed his con- 
science by thinking and saying that the King's 
service might be benefited hereby, forasmuch as it 
was possible in the hurry of business they might 
not have thought of it at court, and the expense 
of sending an express was not considerable to the 
King's majesty. We have said that the nerves of 
the Clerk of the Acts of the Navy were not heroically 
strung ; and albeit he had been twice at sea for a 
short period with his patron my Lord Sandwich, 
Pepys was not a practical seaman. His proper 
and best place, too, was at the Navy-office, where 
there was no other good man of business, and 
where but for him the confusion would have been 
even worse confounded than it was. Yet one day 
Pepys had gone down to Gravesend within ear-shot 
of the Dutch guns, and had looked with a pitying 
or contemptuous eye upon the fooleries of the idle 
lords and young gentlemen that were manning the 
batteries there. He and Sir J. Minnes had also suc- 
ceeded that day in obtaining some money, and had 
partly paid some of the crews of the ships that were 
lying at Deptford and Erith. " But, good Lord," 
said Pepys to himself, " how backwardly things do 
move at this pinch ! We ourselves have been so 
long used to be idle and in despair, that we know 
not what to do ; and the poor sailors that are 
ashore have been so long used to be deceived by 
us as to money, that they won't believe our pro- 
mises, or come to us now that we have really got 
some money to give them ! It is an admirable 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 215 

thing to consider how much king and country 
suffer hereby, and how necessary it is in a state to 
keep the king's ships always in a good posture and 
credit !" 

On his return up the river Pepys had given a 
few thoughts to his worthy friends at Erith. " I 
wonder/' said he to himself, " how it fares with 
Sir John Poundtree, who hath been so misused 
aforetime by the court that it is a marvel he, at 
his time of life, should put on harness or give him- 
self any concern for the King's majesty. I wish he 
were safely back again. I wish (for Pepys, even 
on a day of national calamity and disgrace could 
not help dwelling occasionally upon his own little 
schemes), I wish I could get Sir John Roundtree 
to trust me with the making of a good match for 
his ward, for I do think that mistress Marion, — a 
maiden of most excellent features, and Lord ! what 
a pretty fortune, — would well suit one of my Lord 
Brouncker's sons, or one of Sir William Coventry's 
nephews, or one of Commissioner Petts' brothers ; 
and if we are not torn to pieces, and the state do 
get out of this present trouble, mayhap some match 
may be made at the Navy Board for Marion He- 
mingford, and not without some solatium or credit 
to Samuel Pepys. I have been lucky at such work 
before now. Who was it but I, Samuel Pepys, 
that commenced, carried on, and finally concluded 
the marriage between my Lord Sandwich's eldest 
daughter, the Lady Jem, and the eldest son of Sir 
George Carteret, that lives over the water there at 
Dagenham ? Aye, who was it that took the young 
and rich Mr. Carteret to his first wooing? And 
Lord ! what silly discourse we had as to love-matters, 
he being 1 the most awkward man I ever met with in 



216 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

my life as to that business ! And who was it that 
taught the young man what to do, and how to take 
the young lady always by the hand, and what to say 
to her, and how to discourse with her father and 
mother and her uncles and aunts. I'faith, Mr. Car- 
teret was so backward in his caresses, and so awk- 
ward, that I did nearly all the wooing for him 
myself. It was I that got the licence and bought 
the wedding-ring in London, where the plague was 
raging at the time. For a wedding it was but dull. 
But the modesty and gravity of that business was 
so decent, that it was ten times more delightful to 
me than twenty times the merriment and jollity 
would have been. True, the bridegroom was but 
a laggard. Ha ! ha ! but it is not given to all 
men to be so brisk as Samuel Pepys ; at times I do 
wonder how a tailor could ever have been my father. 
True again, that my Lady Jem was mighty sad on 
the wedding-day, and has never been very merry 
since : but then, where could she have got \ so 
rich and safe a husband as I found her, and her 
father and mother forced her to take ? She has 
six horses to her coach any day she likes ; and 
Marion Hemingford may soon do the same, if we 
can but drive that young Roundhead, Walter 
Wynton, out of her conceit, and bring Sir John 
Roundtree to reason. Of my Lady Roundtree we 
are sure." 

And, in fact, her ladyship had already opened 
the whole of Marion's little story, and the story of 
Walter and the duel, or, as her ladyship called it, 
foul and rebellious murder, to Pepys and his wife, 
together with the plans she had long entertained of 
matching Marion to greatness. 

" I wonder," said Pepys, returning to his match- 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 217 

making cogitations, "what hath become of mine 
old acquaintance Mrs. Carter, who hath lived with 
my Lady Sandwich these fifteen years or more, and 
the sum of all whose discourse and others for her 
at the wooing-time at Dagenham was that I would 
get her a good husband — which I promised to do, 
but have not been able to get done. I must see to 
that. Perhaps, Sir John Roundtree's head man 
hath no wife. Mrs. Carter, thou shalt be thought 
of. It is rather lucky that master Walter hath 
gotten into this trouble. If my wife does not make 
maid Marion fall in love with a town-life ? and 
plays, and fine clothes, and grand equipages, then 
my name is not Samuel Pepys, or the case is hope- 
less. But, Lord ! here am I making fine schemes 
with a sword over my head, and the country in 
danger, and this shame hanging upon it ! Bessy, 
dear, Will Hewer, I would fain know how ye are 
speeding with the money-bags. May the night be 
dark when ye hide the gold — 

' Come thick night — ' 

as the players say." 

It was well for Marion that Pepys's anxieties 
about his money, and his numerous occupations, and 
the absence for several days of Mrs. Pepys from 
London, stopped the current of the matrimonial 
scheme, as otherwise she might have been more 
annoyed than she was. For nearly a week the 
Clerk of the Acts was too busy to'do more than pay 
a flying visit to the ladies in the Minories ; but he 
put a trusty and knowing servant in attendance on 
them, and they were otherwise well taken care of 
by their host and hostess. One day, when the 
troops had all marched, and the town seemed very 



218 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

quiet, Lady Roundtree must needs go to the courfc 
end of town to see what was doing on the Mall 
and in the parks, and to try if she could not get a 
glimpse of my Lady Castlemaine's laced smocks, 
which, as Sir Ralph Spicer had assured her, were 
frequently hung out at the back of her lodging in 
the Privy Garden. Marion, whose heart was too 
sad to think of amusement, and whose taste was too 
good to find it in the frivolities which pleased her 
ladyship, and who thought it a sin to seek for plea- 
sure in the midst of a national calamity, and while 
her kind old guardian was exposed to danger, and 
her own true love a fugitive, begged to stay at 
home with the good hostess, and was at last al- 
lowed so to do, though not without sundry strong 
expressions of her ladyship's astonishment and dis- 
pleasure. Her ladyship set forth in a hired vehicle, 
attended by the host, the butler, her own woman, 
and two of Sir John's Kentish footmen, so that in 
point of attendance at least she made a consider- 
able show. When she returned she was in an ec- 
stasy at all that she had seen, and wondered how 
she could have supported life so long in such a 
clownish dismal place as Erith. Marion handed 
her a letter which she had just received from a 
messenger dispatched by her guardian. Her lady- 
ship threw the letter upon the table and said, " Sir 
John, thou art a fool, and I have been a fool in 
being so submissive a wife ! But I will bear it no 
longer. A mouthful of court air hath put a new 
spirit into me, and I will do as other ladies do — I 
will live a month every year in London, though we 
should part company, Sir John Roundtree." This 
idea was so uppermost in her mind, that it was 
some time before her ladyship would read the 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 219 

knight's letter, or hear Marion read it to her. At 
last, however, she said — " Child, tell me what Sir 
John saith ; my eyes are somewhat tired with the 
splendour of the sights I have seen, and the old 
gentleman writes but a crabbed hand." Marion 
almost smiled inwardly, knowing that her ladyship 
was no great adept at reading any kind of writing ; 
but she instantly broke open the seal and read with 
a right joyous heart that her guardian was in good 
health and condition ; that he had done some little 
service in carrying some brave Kentish lads with 
some arms and stores to Chatham, and in calling 
out the Kentish militia ; that as the Dutch had 
quitted the Medway after doing all the harm they 
could, he had come back across the country to 
Gravesend, where he now was at the head of a band 
of volunteers, to assist in erecting batteries, and to 
be ready to march to any point on the banks of the 
Thames, into which river the Dutch had again sent 
some of their ships. The knight further said that 
he had been to his house at Erith, and had found 
all things there in good order, and as he had left 
them, except only that the monkey which Sir 
Ralph Spicer had given to her ladyship was no 
more. " That mischievous ape," said Sir John, 
" after getting loose into the flower-garden, and 
destroying all Marion's pretty flowers, was found 
one morning hanging from an apple-tree at the 
end of his own chain ; but whether he met his fate 
at the hands of Hodge the gardener, or hanged 
himself in a fit of spleen brought on by the soli- 
tude of the place, I have not been at the trouble 
to determine." Here her ladyship interrupted the 
reading of the letter by saying that it was all the 
doing of that monster Hodge, and that he ought 



220 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

to be hanged for it. " And/' continued Marion, 
reading the knight's letter, " as that outlandish 
talking-bird was reported to me and proved by 
mine own ears, to be much addicted to speak evil 
words, and indecent, and such as ill-befit a virtuous 
and delicate maiden to hear, I have thought fit to 
send it to Mike Woodenspoon, our barber and 
constable, who hath engaged to teach the bird 
better things." " Poor dear Sir Ralph !" exclaimed 
her ladyship, clasping her hands and almost wring- 
ing them - " little didst thou think that thy dear, 
pretty, mischievous monkey would be hanged like 
a common thief, and thy pretty prattling ^bird be 
given over to a common village barber! 'Tis 
almost enough to make thee rise from thy gory 
bed ! Ah ! ah ! Sir John, this is tyranny such as 
no town-living dame would bear. But read on, 
tell me more of my wrongs .... But child, what 
ails thee ? Why art so mute ? Why so red and now 
so pale ? Why dost drop the letter ? Nay, sweet 
Marion, what is it stops thy breath thus? Is 
there a sequel of woe ? Does the letter end in bad 
news from my husband? God forefend !" 

Her ladyship's better feelings had now the 
upper hand, and thinking no more about courts 
and parks, or Spicers, apes, parrots, or any other 
mean thing, she clasped Marion in her arms, who 
was near fainting and falling upon the floor, and 
called aloud for help and for vinegar, and cold 
water and burnt feathers, and prayed an audible 
and most fervent prayer that no evil might befall 
her good knight, her kind and indulgent husband. 
Marion drank of some water and was well again 
without further aid. Her ladyship took up the 
letter she had let fall, but not being able to read 



MISRESS MARION IN LONDON. 221 

it, she laid it upon the table and implored Marion 
to tell her the worst of the news that was in it, and 
not to conceal anything from her. 

" There follows no news but good news/' said 
Marion. 

" Then why that tremor and that faint ?" said 
her ladyship. 

" Bid these good people leave the room, and I 
will read the rest of the letter," said Marion with 
a deep blush. 

The two handmaidens and the kind hostess who 
had run at her ladyship's loud call, quitted the 
room ; and then, with many more blushes, Marion 
read a post-scriptum to the knight's letter, which 
was considerably longer than the letter itself, and 
which related with honest warmth the noble ex- 
ploits performed by Walter Wynton and Tom of 
the Woods in the improvised battery on the 
Medway. 

" These things," said the knight, " were spe- 
cially brought to my knowledge by an honourable 
Kentish gentleman, who 'saw master Walter run- 
ning from the fame he had earned, and by a general 
officer of high repute, who saith so good a deed 
hath not been done in war ; and I also, from the 
cherry-orchards of Gillingham, did see with mine 
own eyes Yan Ghent put to his wits' end, and his 
ships brought to a dead stop, and then well ham- 
mered on their ribs by that little battery, albeit 
I little thought that master Walter was there. 
Whither he hath now betaken himself I know not. 
But this I do know, that, though he may think 
otherwise, he hath no longer any evil consequences 
to fear from the affair on Plumstead Common. 
None of the courtiers and officers of whom I have 



222 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

had speech know anything of that duello, or care 
one straw for what hath befallen my unwise and 
unlucky kinsman Sir Ralph — whose sins may the 
Lord forgive ! — and the Duke of Albemarle and 
all the great Lords know all about the battery. 
Moreover, the father of this youth, Captain Wyn- 
ton, against whom I have been too uncharitable 
and unneighbourly in the days that are past, hath 
comported himself most manfully, and like a man 
whose heart was all for his country. Sick and 
feeble as he was, and grieving as he was for the 
flight of his only son, and exasperated, as he tells 
me he was, by the belief that the courtiers would 
accuse that honourable youth of a foul murder, he 
went down to the king's ships at Deptford that 
morning we left Erith, and, by presents of money 
and the old influence he had over the minds of the 
seamen, he got many to return to their duty, and 
so got some few of the ships in a condition to fight 
the enemy. And since that day the said Captain 
Wynton hath travailed day and night in the good 
cause ; and albeit he hath not been able to prevent 
many evil and silly things which have been done 
by order of some of our great men, he hath himself 
planned and executed nearly everything that hath 
been well done. Having with mine own eyes seen 
much of this, I could no longer refuse the hand of 
friendship — and Wynton and I are friends. He is 
now lying in the Hope with a few well-manned 
and well-governed ships, the which, though not 
by warrant or commission under his command, 
will certainly obey no orders but his. I would 
we could know where his son hath bestowed him- 
self." 

Before the over-delighted and agitated Marion 



MISTRESS MARION IN LONDON. 223 

had finished reading this long postscript, her fears 
having all vanished, her ladyship had relapsed into 
her bad humour. She had never liked Walter, 
chiefly because he had never flattered her ; and she 
could not forgive him for killing Sir Ealph, who 
had flattered her to her heart's content. She saw 
in the sudden friendship between Sir John and the 
Roundhead captain a bar to her great scheme for 
marrying Marion to a lord. But, just as she was 
on the point of giving expression to some of her 
displeasure, voices were heard on the stairs saying, 
" Mrs. Pepys, 'tis the sweet Mrs. Pepys ;" and in 
the next instant the gay and pretty wife of the 
Clerk of the Acts of the Navy swam into the 
room. She had just returned from the country, 
which she liked no more than Lady Eoundtree did ; 
and was very cheerful and talkative, for she had 
got all the gold safely buried in her father-in-law's 
garden ; and she had bought a span new dress, and 
Pepys had just vowed that he had never seen her 
look so handsome in all his born days. 

Mrs. Pepys was not a person to be disliked, for 
herself, by any ; one but Marionhad seen ladies she 
liked much better (though good-natured, she was 
so worldly, and so vain and fine and wordy) ; and 
though of a forgiving nature, she could not quite 
pardon her for certain reflections she had let drop 
in her hearing upon the subject of matrimony. On 
the other side, Lady Roundtree was perfectly fas- 
cinated with Pepys's wife. Marion soon withdrew 
and left them together. Her ladyship told her 
dear friend all about the post-scriptum to Sir John's 
letter, and made a mournful comment upon it. 
Mrs. Pepys applied her ingenuity to dissipate this 

l2 



224 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

uneasiness. " 'Tis certainly unlucky/ ' said she, 
" that these things should have befallen. But, after 
all that may be said and done, the young Round- 
head may not find it so easy to get the King's pardon 
for slaying a courtier and gallant like Sir Ralph 
Spicer. So cheer up, my lady." 



( 225 ) 



CHAPTER XL 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN". 

Tom of the Woods did not recover quite so soon 
as he and his friends expected. For several days 
he suffered a slow fever, and even when that was 
gone, something more difficult to cure remained 
behind ; for a bullet which had entered at his 
shoulder, had lodged in such a way that our not 
very skilful Kentish mediciners could not get at it. 
Walter and Will Gaff attended on him with great 
care and affection. One day, after a good sound 
doze, Tom said to Walter, who was alone with him 
in the room — " I have been dreaming a dream, in 
which it was made appear that the whole of my 
life since the day I got this deep cut across my 
brow has been nothing but a dream. Master Wal- 
ter, give me those good housewife shears, that I 
may cut off this beard ; for I will be a prophet 
and hermit no longer ; but try and think and live 
like other men. I fear that in the time of my 
illusion I may have said and done presumptuous 
and unholy things ; but 't was this wound, master 
Walter, } t was this hurt on the brain, and then the 
harro wings and persecutions I met with. But 't is 
over now — I feel as if something had been taken 
out of my head — so give me the shears, and let me 
destroy this evidence of my past madness." 



226 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

Seeing that he was perfectly reasonable and 
composed, Walter handed him the scissors, and 
between them the long beard was presently cut off. 

When Will Gaff came in to relieve guard by the 
bedside, he saw Tom sitting up in his bed, and his 
beard lying on the floor at the bed-foot. Will 
could scarcely believe his eyes ; and so he rubbed 
them and looked again, first at Tom, and next at 
the floor. There was no mistake — here lay the 
grey tresses of the beard, and there was Tom with- 
out his beard. So Will gave a whistle and a tug 
to either side of his nethermost garment, and then 
said — " Singe me, old Tom, but now you look like 
a Christian, and like other people ! But let me 
finish you off with a clean shave. I always shaved 
my mess when I was afloat, and the ship chaplain 
and the purser to boot." 

Tom gladly assented ; and with the well-sharp- 
ened razors of the Kentish farmer, Will Gaff 
shaved the ex-prophet to perfection. Of late Will 
had only practised upon the stubble of his own 
chin ; and he was so proud of this performance, 
that he vowed he had got at Tom's bristles a day's 
march behind the skin. Then he gazed at Tom 
as a curious connoisseur would look at a picture ; 
and after another whistle, he said that he could 
hardly have thought that the old chap had been so 
handsome. 

For some time before this Walter had seen 
symptoms of a returning sanity in the doughty old 
trooper. This might have been partly caused by 
the very copious blood-letting which Tom had got 
in the fight outside the battery. The wound across 
the opposite side of the head may also have done 
some good; as men whose intellects have been 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN. 227 

injured by one wound in that important region, 
have been known to recover their wits years after 
in consequence of a second wound there. But 
Walter preferred believing that the excitement of 
patriotism had quieted the stimulus of insanity and 
fanaticism, and that Tom's mind, being suddenly 
thrown upon a new object, and kept to that one 
object for two or three days — which had been days 
of most active operation and brave doings — had 
been enabled to recover the balance which had 
been so long [lost. But perhaps, after all, Will 
Gaff's explanation of the phenomenon was the best. 
" Our friend Tom, d'ye see (Will used to say 
afterwards), never hid a black heart under his 
hatches, like Joel Wyke, and so he has always had 
a friend up aloft ; and so, d'ye see, in good time 
he hath been brought back to his senses." 

One thing was quite certain — Tom was now as 
sane as most men, and a great deal saner than 
many great men who then mismanaged and dis- 
graced poor old England. As he continued to 
suffer much inconvenience from the ball, and as no 
chirurgeon could be found in those parts skilful 
enough to extract it, Walter resolved to have him 
conveyed to London; and as soon as he seemed 
able to bear the journey, Tom was laid in a horse- 
litter. If they had fallen among a people less 
kind-hearted or less well-to-do in the world than 
these good Kentish men of the Hundred of Hoo, 
there might have been sundry impediments offered 
to their proceeding ; for master Walter had been 
lightened of his purse while in the mob at Eatcliffe 
Highway, and he, Tom, and Will Gaff had not a 
stiver among them. But his kind host and neigh- 
bours gladly lent Walter twenty good guineas, and 



228 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

clothes and horses for the journey, refusing to 
take a note for the amount. Some of the best of 
them would have accompanied the party ; but as 
the Dutch fleet was still lying at the Nore, Walter 
recommended them to stop at home and attend to 
the defence of their families and property. " Well !" 
said the honest yeomen, " it shall be as it pleases 
you ; we have kept your secret while you have been 
here ; but if you should want friends to speak out 
and up for you in London or elsewhere, even if it 
should be in the presence of the black-faced chap 
at Whitehall, we will all come at your call." 

The party then set off, the ex-prophet being 
carried in the litter, and Walter and Gaff being 
well mounted. The deficient parts of their ward- 
robe had been made up by the farmers, so that 
both the young gentleman and the tarpaulin had 
a slouched hat and a good serge doublet. Walter 
on his Kentish nag, and in this attire, might have 
passed very well for a young farmer; but as for 
Will Gaff — there was hardly any saying what he 
could pass for, for the sailor part of him could not 
be disguised, and he managed his horse as if he had 
been steering a ship. Avoiding the frequented 
roads as much as was possible, they shaped their 
course for Erith. They knew how to get quiet 
accommodation among sure friends in the neigh- 
bourhood of that place, and it was doubtful whether 
poor Tom could bear a longer journey in one day. 
But it must not be concealed, that Walter on his 
own private account wished to stop at Erith, whi- 
ther he half hoped that Sir John Eoundtree and 
Marion had returned. They were kindly enter- 
tained in the cottage of a woodman, an old and 
fast friend of Tom, who did not cease to be a friend 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN. 229 

— as there were many that did — because Tom had 
ceased to be a prophet. In the dusk of that even- 
ing, Walter and Will Gaff, with their slouched 
hats pulled well over their faces, went into the 
village in quest of information ; for, with the blood 
of Sir John's kinsman upon his head, Walter felt 
that he could not present himself at the good 
knight's house. 

" There sits a barber at his shop-door," said 
Will ; " and in whatsoever land I have been the 
barber is the best of gossips." I 

" 'Tis Mike Woodenspoon, the constable," said 
Walter ; " and Mike knows my voice too well for 
any dress or darkness to disguise me." 

" Then do you stay where you are, and I will 
hail him," said Will. 

Mike, who was busied in teaching a better 
vocabulary to the parrot, was presently accosted 
by Gaff, who went to work with more ingenuity 
than might have been expected from him. After 
replying to Mike's professional question, whether 
he should trim his beard, Will entered into a dis- 
sertation upon the art of shaving in general ; and 
told the Erith professor that his own father had 
been one of the first men of England at taking off 
other men's beards, and that he himself had been 
in a manner bred to the profession : and when 
Mike's heart began to open, Will offered to show 
him a trick of shaving he had learned up the 
Arches among the Turks — " who be (said Will) 
the best shavers in the world, although they shave 
the crown of their heads instead of their chins." 
Mike was so pleased that he sent for a cup of 
good ale; and over this beverage Gaff got all the 
information that he, or rather master Walter, 

l 3 



230 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

wanted ; the cream of it being that mistress Marion 
and Lady Roundtree were comfortably lodged at the 
hostel in the Minories, and that Sir John Round- 
tree and Captain Wynton, and all manner of 
honourable gentlemen, were down at Gravesend 
making the defences of the river so strong that 
there could be no more fear of the Dutch coming 
up. 

On the following morning, at a very early hour, 
the journey was resumed. Our travellers could 
no longer shun observation, for every road and 
path was thronged, and militia and other troops 
were marching and countermarching in all direc- 
tions. Tom in his litter, however, was taken to be 
some poor sailor wounded in the affair at the Med- 
way ; so few questions were put, and no interrup- 
tion offered to the progress of the party by any one. 
It grieved Walter to go through Charlton without 
riding aside to his father's house to tell the servants 
that he was alive and well ; but as he knew that 
his father's housekeeper was almost as great a gos- 
sip as Mike Woodenspoon, and as the village was 
crowded with court gallants and officers of the 
King's guard, he thought it best to bring the 
flap of his farmer's hat still more over his face, and 
to push forward as quickly as the motion of Tom's 
horse -litter would allow. Since quitting his con- 
cealment in the Hundred of Hoo, Walter's heart 
had been gladdened by the reports he heard of the 
patriotism, activity, and unanimity of all classes of 
the nation ; but upon Blackheath he saw and heard 
that which convinced him the madness and im- 
morality of the times were not cured in all quarters. 
At a sort of encampment the soldiers of the King's 
guards were reviling some of the train-bands of the 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN. 231 

city, and calling them cuckolds, Roundheads, and 
crop -ears. Some of these guardsmen were singing 
in insulting chorus — 

11 My lord mayor and ye aldermen, 
Your gowns must make ye breeches ; 
And if ye do retort agen, 
We '11 make you eat your speeches. 

O brave eommon-council-men ! 

O brave trained bands ! 

What ! do you think to get again 

The staff in your own hands ?" 

Even some of the officers of the guards were 
joining their men in these indecorous exercises of 
the tongue. 

" 'T is well for these profligate gallants, " said 
Tom, rising in his litter, " that old Skippon is not 
here." 

" But Skippon, or no Skippon," said Will, 
" those citizens would not stand it if they were 
not so few." 

As our friends were descending Greenwich Hill 
they overtook a few sailors and petty officers, who 
were walking leisurely towards London ; and Gaff, 
asking them what cheer, they fell into talk. 

" Sever was worse cheer," said one of the petty 
officers, an old man with a shrewd countenance. 
" Never was worse cheer for England ! I have 
weathered many a gale in my time, but this last 
will be the death of me." 

" Tut ! Shipmate," said Will, u talk not of 
dying ! Our flag shall be made clean again, man. 
This present ruffle is over. At least the Thames 
is made safe." 

" Perhaps yes, perhaps no/' said the other. " I 



232 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

take it, it is pretty much as de Ruyter and Van 
Ghent may chance to be daring or over-cautious. 
In thine ear, friend, I may tell thee that, with half 
their force, they might yet come up this river and 
burn every ship in it, in spite of all the ships that 
have been sunk by our land-admirals." 

" 'Tis a cruel pass indeed," said Will Gaff, 
" when Englishmen sink their ships instead of 
fighting them." 

" The sights I have seen down yonder," said the 
old boatswain, " be enough to drive an old sailor stark 
mad. Nothing all day but patteraro batteries, and 
horse-soldiers and foot-soldiers scrimmaging about, 
and a set of debauched, damning, swearing rogues 
of young officers and lordlings, doing or ordering 
all that ought not to be done. This is a sad 
instance of the condition we are in ! " 

" But," said Walter, " there be now officers 
who know their business, and men of worshipful 
behaviour." 

" Aye ! " said the boatswain, " but they cannot 
undo what hath been done. Prince Rupert, who 
may be a very good officer of horse, for all that I 
know to the contrary, has been sinking ships at 
Deptford, Woolwich, and elsewhere, where they 
offer no impediment at high-water ; and such hath 
been the confusion among the King's people, that 
instead of taking unfinished vessels, or old ones of 
small value, they have scuttled and sunk some of 
the most precious ships in the river, and sundry 
which had been completely fitted out for fire-ships 
at great charge, and which, if they had been sent 
down at the proper time, would have singed the 
Dutchman's beard. They have sunk the ' Frank- 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN. 233 

lin,' one of the King's ships, which had long been 
loaded for supply of other ships with stores to a 
great value ; they have scuttled another ship with 
a rich cargo on board, and have made the same use 
of a fine foreign and neutral vessel, that had the 
faith of the nation for her security. Worse than 
this, they were going to make a bridge of boats for 
the passage of cavalry, as though the river and the 
shipping were to be defended by troops of horse." 

" Well," said Gaff, " mad as they may be at 
Whitehall, surely some of these fools will pay for it." 

" Not they," said the boatswain ; " every one of 
them will say that he acted under orders ; and those 
who gave the orders and made these precious plans 
will severally deny what they have done, and throw 
the blame each man from his own shoulders to 
those of somebody else ; and in truth they were all 
commanding and ordering together. And the big 
Lords be too big to be touched, and too strong at 
court : perchance they may overhaul some poor 
devil of a captain or third-rate commissioner-man, 
but that will be all, take my word for it." 

" But I know what they deserve," said Gaff, 
" and what those deserve who stopped the pay of 
the seamen and advised his Majesty to fit out no 
fleet this spring." 

Quoth the old petty officer, " And so do I — a 
coil of rope at the yard-arm for the worst of them, 
and the capstan, bilboes, ducking, and keel-haul- 
ing for the rest of them. The dishonour they have 
brought upon us is never to be wiped off." 

On drawing near London-bridge it was neces- 
sary for our travellers to settle where they should 
take up their abode, a point which had not yet 
been determined. As none of them knew much 



234 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

about town, and as the greater part of what they 
had known of the city had been burned down by 
the 'great fire, they were somewhat puzzled. As 
concealment was still held to be necessary, every 
common tavern-keeper was not to be trusted. Tom 
said tli at they might still find quarters at Hiram 
Bingley's ; but Walter could not for a moment 
think of returning to that cave of fanatics and con- 
spirators, nor did Tom upon reflection relish the 
idea. At last Will Gaff bethought him of a house 
of entertainment in Water-lane, which was kept 
by the mother of one of his old shipmates. 

" 'Tis but a poorish place for a gentleman of 
quality like you, master Walter," said Will ; " but 
mother Sherman is a clean and notable woman, and 
as trusty and honest a soul as ever broke bread." 

Walter thought this house would do very well, 
for it was near the Minories, whither he had re- 
solved to repair in his disguise as soon as he should 
see Tom comfortably lodged and attended to. 
Poor Tom, who was suffering considerable pain 
from his jolting, was only anxious to get to a bed 
somewhere. The party therefore made for mother 
Sherman's with all the speed they could. 

In the narrowest part of Old Tower-street, near 
the end of Mark-lane and the ancient church 
of Allhallows Barking, they were brought to a 
sudden stop by some carts and trucks which w r ere 
carrying stores to the Tower, and which com- 
pletely blocked up the way, so that neither the 
litter nor a single horse could pass. Walter dis- 
mounted to see whether he could induce the drivers 
to move on or make room for him, and was in the 
act of addressing a few courteous words to the men, 
when he heard a voice which made him start as " the 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWX. 235 

cry of fire " makes men start " in populous cities." 
It was a voice blustering and swearing in the rear of 
the horse-litter, and cursing Will GafF for block- 
ing up the way to men of honour and office ; to 
which Will was replying by pointing forward to the 
carts and trucks that seemed wheel-locked and 
wedged all together. Retracing the few steps he 
had made on foot, Walter saw in the middle of the 
narrow way, just behind the litter — Sir Ralph 
Spicer and another gentleman in a stupendous 
periwig. Somewhat thinner he was and paler 
than he had been on Plumstead Common ; but still 
he was visibly and unmistakably Sir Ralph Spicer, 
in broad daylight, and with nothing ghostly about 
him, for the paleness of his face was relieved by 
the redness of his nose, and by that thin- streak of 
red across the cheek-bone which rarely forsakes 
men addicted to strong drinks. Yet as Walter 
recalled the last thrust he had given him, and his 
fall into that deep pit, he thought that he must be 
deceived by some extraordinary resemblance of 
voice and person — that this impatient and swag- 
gering cavaliero might be some twin-brother 
of Sir Ralph. But poor Tom, who had raised 
himself in the litter at the first sound of the well- 
remembered voice, and who was looking steadfastly 
at the cavalier, said, as Walter came up to him — 
" 'Tis the Lord's doing, and wonderful in mine 
eyes ; but, as I live, here 's the courtier you van- 
quished and left in the gravel-pit ; and seemingly 
not much the worse for the hole you drilled 
through him." 

Walter continued gazing at the knight, from 
whom he was not three yards distant : he could not 
take his eyes off his face to look at his companion 



236 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

or at any other object ; but presently the gentle- 
man in the ambrosial locks said, in a good tem- 
pered persuasive tone — " Patience, Sir Ealph 
Spicer — patience, dear Sir Ralph, these fellows 
cannot move out of our way until the carts get out 
of their way. We had better turn back and take 
another road, for I should not like to soil my best 
suit. We shall get to the Minories by the time 
the ladies are ready to receive us." 

" Stop !" cried Walter, springing towards them, 
and nearly overturning the litter. 

" What would'st thou, young man?" said the 
gentleman in the periwig, whom Walter had now 
time to recognise as Mr. Pepys, but of whom he 
took no further heed. 

" Sir Ralph Spicer," said Walter, grasping the 
cavalier's arm, as if to assure himself still further 
that this was no vision, " I am glad to see you 
thus ! Do you not know me ?" 

" Sirrah !" quoth Sir Ralph, " I have no ac- 
quaintance with men of your classis. Take your 
hand from my arm ; this familiarity ill-becomes 
one of your condition." 

Walter, who had spoken in a husky voice very 
unlike his ordinary one, still grasped the cavalier's 
arm, but, in an instant or two, recollecting himself, 
and what coat and hat he had got on, he let go the 
arm, and taking off his slouched Kentish felt and 
looking the Knight close in the face, he said — " Do 
you know me now, Sir Ralph ? Have you forgotten 
Plumstead Common ?" 

The cavalier stept back several paces, saying 
nothing and looking somewhat sheepish ; but Pepys 
said, "As I live, 'tis master Walter Wynton, of 
whom there hath been evil report as well as good." 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN. 237 

Giving only a slight nod of recognition to Pepys, 
whose countenance was rather confused, Walter 
stepped up to the cavalier, who now leaned against 
the wall of a house with his hand not upon, yet not 
far from, the hilt of his sword. 

" You know me now, Sir Ealph," said Walter ; 
u and I say again, I am glad to see you here, for 
much as you had wronged me, your life-blood lay 
heavy on my soul. Only cross not my path again, 
and have a care of what you do and say there in 
the Minor ies." 

" Mr. Wynton," said the knight, " you had me 
at a vantage— my nerves were out of order that 
morning, and my foot slipped on the heath, 
and " 

" If you are not satisfied, Sir Ealph," said 
Walter, " we had better meet again in a more re- 
gular manner and in place of your own choosing ; 
for, though I like not these duellos when my head is 
cool, I will bear no slur upon my honour. If there 
was vantage or foul play, 't was all on your side, 
and you know it." 

" It was so, and I was witness thereunto," said 
Tom, looking out of the litter, and looking so 
ghastly pale that Pepys almost shuddered at the 
sight of him. 

Sir Ealph, who had not the remotest wish to 
measure swords again, and who felt it would be 
useless to try and play the bully, said he thought 
it would be better to let the matter remain where 
it was, as a recent court of honour had decided it 
would be wrong to fight twice in one quarrel. 
Pepys said he was most decidedly of the same opi- 
nion ; and that, as a mob of people was gathering 
round them, they had better part. The Clerk of 



238 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

the Acts was indeed very anxious to be gone, no 
man loving discord less, or hating fighting more, 
than he did. But Tom, who had heard e very- 
word, and who knew Pepys's intermeddling cha- 
racter, and the reasons which Walter had for dis- 
liking Sir Ralph's visit to the Minories, said he 
had a word to speak in Mr. Pepys's ear, of great 
concernment — a secret to tell him which none else 
must hear. Pepys did not much relish the looks 
of such an interlocutor, but the bait of a secret 
was what he could never resist ; so, upon assur- 
ances from Will GafF, who was holding the horses, 
that the sick man was in a sound state of mind, 
the Clerk of the Acts leaned his head over the 
litter. 

" Samuel Pepys ! Oh, Samuel ! " said Tom, in 
a solemn and awful whisper : " Thou art a great 
man now, and a loyal, and all for king and high 
church; but dost remember the thirtieth of January, 
and i Let the memory of the wicked perish ? * " 

" Hush ! " said Pepys, trembling in his shoes ; 
" hush, man, there be things not to be said even in 
a whisper ! But how earnest thou by that know- 
ledge? What art thou ? " 

" A very lowly man," said Tom, " but one who 
well knew both thee and thy father the tailor, and 
who knows others who knew ye both well when ye 
used to bring home General Harrison's breeches, 
and make such speeches among the Lord Protector's 
people that all men took ye for the hottest " 

" Name it not, friend," said Pepys, who had a 
cold sweat on his brow ; " name it not to living 
man. I will give thee gold to keep this secret.' ' 

" Samuel Pepys/' said Tom, " I want not mo- 
ney — I care not for thy gold, and thou canst best 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN. 239 

tell whether it hath been honestly come by. But 
listen ! Cast loose this reprobate, Sir Ralph. 
No more of thy match-makings, or thy doings 
like those at Dagenham, or I will proclaim all that 
I know of thee by sound of trumpet on Tower 
Hill ! " 

" Lord ! Lord !" said Pepys, shaking all over like 
a jelly ; " but how earnest thou to the knowledge of 
all this ? Who and what art thou ? " 

" I am he that was Tom of the Woods." 

Pepys trembled still more, and the sweat on his 
brow was colder. 

" Friend Pepys," cried Sir Ralph, who was very 
impatient to be gone, " what are you talking so 
long about with that sick man, who perhaps hath 
the plague upon him." 

At any other time the word plague would have 
made Pepys scamper ; but now he stood where he 
was by the litter, and after saying, " Anon, anon," 
to Sir Ralph, he whispered to Tom, " Friend, I 
will purchase thy silence with any service that I 
can do : but prithee what else dost thou know of 



me 



?" 



" Much," said Tom, " much ; but especially this, 
that thou art a great coward ; and from this one 
fact I feel assured that thou wilt not risk exposure 
in provoking my sure vengeance by intermeddling 
in the concerns of master Walter Wynton and 
mistress Marion Hemingford." 

" Friend," said Pepys, " only keep my secret, 
and I will never thwart master Walter in anything, 
but befriend him where I may." 

" 'Tis a compact between me and thee," said 
Tom ; " so go and leave me ; for although there is 
no further need for master Walter to hide himself, 



240 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

I must not have it known just yet where I am 

about to abide There be warrants out against 

me." 

" We will get them called in," said Pepys ; 
" but nobody will think about them now, so fear 
nothing, my dear friend. If you should need aid, 
I live hard by, in Seething Lane." 

" I know it," said Tom ; " but leave me. The 
carts are clearing away, and we may now pass ; so 
while we go this way, do you go that" 

Obeying Tom's signal, Pepys darted up Mark 
Lane, being closely followed by Sir Ralph, who 
for some seconds past had been foaming with im- 
patience. Our cavalcade moved onward, and soon 
came to Mother Sherman's, where the ci-devant 
prophet amused Walter with an account of his 
whispered colloquy with the Clerk of the Acts. 
" Perhaps," said Tom, " it needed not ; yet still it 
may be well to have Pepys for a friend, he is such 
a shifty and clever man ; and I could not with- 
stand the temptation of bringing down his crest, 
especially as he seemed to be inclined to be less 
courteous to you, master Walter, than he ought 
to have been." 

A good room, with a down bed in it, was pro- 
cured for the wounded man, and a stable hard by 
for the horses. Walter's next care was to get a 
proper surgeon. A messenger and a fee soon 
brought one of the best in the city ; and, before 
Tom had been two hours under the roof of Mother 
Sherman, the ball, to his instant relief, was re- 
moved, and proper medicament applied. 

Then, leaving the invalid to enjoy rest and sleep, 
Walter sallied forth with Will Gaff to purchase 
some linen and clothes. The coat and beaver, 



THE PROPHET COME TO TOWN. 241 

which Walter procured ready-made, would not 
have satisfied the critical eye of Samuel Pepys ; but 
Walter, who was never very fastidious about these 
things, was in a great hurry to reach the hostel in 
the Minories, and so put on the first decent coat 
and hat he could find. While he was equipping 
himself at the tailor s, the Tower guns were heard 
firing, and proclamation was made in the streets, 
that five of his Majesty's ships, led on by Captain 
Wynton, had chased twenty Dutch men-of-war 
from the Lower Hope, and had burned one of 
them . 

" This is a blessed omen," said Walter. 



( 242 ) 



CHAPTER XII. 

DOMESTIC PEACE AFTER WAR AND SHAME. 

On the day preceding our hero's arrival in town, 
Pepys had been thrown into consternation, by 
learning that Commissioner Phineas Pett had been 
arrested and thrown into the Tower. Fearing that 
the same measure would be dealt to others, the 
Clerk of the Acts had hurried to Whitehall to 
speak with his patrons and protectors, and to provide 
by other means against the storm. To his no 
small astonishment, the first man he had met in the 
matted gallery had been Sir Ralph Spicer. Sir 
Ralph's story had been soon told. That worthy 
knight had been so fortunate as to fall upon a soft 
place — upon the sand, rather than upon the gravel, 
of that broad and deep Plumstead pit ; and although 
"Walter's sword had nearly gone through him, it 
had touched no vital part. Faittout had soon run 
to his assistance, as had also some gravel-diggers 
who occupied an almost invisible little hut inside 
the pit. By their means the blood was stanched, and 
the fainting knight brought to himself. The pit-men 
had a dapple donkey, and upon this unchivalrous 
animal Sir Ralph had been conveyed from Plum- 
stead Common to Charlton Place, where Sir Wil- 
liam Ducie, the city knight, who was aspiring after 
court honours and loftier titles, had given him a 
tolerably hospitable reception ; Sir Ralph having 



DOMESTIC PEACE AFTER WAR. 243 

contrived to convince him, as he had done so many- 
others, that his influence at Whitehall, and espe- 
cially among the King's women, was great. A 
tolerably good surgeon had been brought from the 
neighbouring town of Greenwich ; and under his 
hands the cavalier's wound had been healed in 
about a fortnight, during the greater part of which 
time he had the fine house at Charlton nearly all 
to himself, as Sir William had been called to the 
field with some of the Kentish militia. This story 
had been soon told to Pepys, who, in return, had 
told Sir Ralph of the whereabout of Lady Round- 
tree and Marion ; and as the Clerk of the Acts had 
met with an encouraging reception at court, and 
had been so brought back to the cheerful, social 
humour which was natural to him, he had readily- 
engaged to conduct Sir Ralph to the Minories, and 
present him to the ladies as one risen from the 
dead. But Pepys, always cautious, had put off this 
visit for the following day, in order to have time 
to prepare the ladies' nerves. — " For," said he, 
" were we to go at once, they might take you for a 
ghost, my dear Sir Ralph ; and Mrs. Pepys, who is 
inseparable with Lady Roundtree, and who hath 
shed so many tears for your supposed fate, is a silly 
creature in some things, and somewhat subject to 
fits." 

" And certainly," said Sir Ralph, " my too 
sudden appearance might be too much for the 
nerves of Lady Roundtree. As for mistress Ma- 
rion, who must have been the means of setting that 
peppery young Roundhead upon me, we will 
not speak of her just now. But, my dear friend 
Pepys, you are a man of affairs, and patient and 
knowing in these things, and we must lay our 



244 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

heads together, and get up a marriage for that 
saucy wench. You know her fortune, and how 
many young lords would snap at her. I would 
give her to the devil rather than that Walter 
Wynton should have her." " 'T has been thought 
of already," said Pepys, " and Lady Roundtree and 
my wife are with us." 

The day after this, Mr. Pepys and Sir Ealph 
had met by appointment at the Devil tavern in 
Fleet Street, and they were not only on their way 
to the Minories, but were also engaged in deep 
talk about Marion and her fortune, when they 
were brought to a stand by the stoppage in Tower 
Street, and to the discourse which we have reported 
with master Walter and Tom of the Woods. 

After that talk with the ex-prophet, Pepys 
heartily wished Sir Ealph back at Whitehall, or 
anywhere but with him. He could not, however, 
avoid conducting the cavalier to the ladies. Ma- 
rion was not in the drawing-room, having reso- 
lutely refused to see Sir Ralph. She rejoiced on 
Walter's account, and perhaps even a little on his 
own, that the insolent cavalier had not been killed, 
but meet him she would not. Her ladyship re- 
ceived Sir Ralph with ecstasy, and Mrs. Pepys was 
scarcely less ecstatic. But the Clerk of the Acts, 
at the very first opportunity, whispered to his wife, 
" Bessy, we must proceed no farther in this busi- 
ness. Walter Wynton is in possession of my se- 
cret ! We must be neutral between him and this 
cavalier, or befriend him rather than Sir Ralph." 

And from this instant Mrs. Pepys, like the 
dutiful wife she was, was rather cold than otherwise 
to Sir John's cousin ; and when, after an hour's 
visit, and a deal of nonsensical talk, that gentle- 



DOMESTIC PEACE AFTEIt WAR. 245 

man took his departure, Mrs. Pepys joined her 
husband in making sundry moral reflections upon 
the looseness of his life and conversation, and told 
Lady Roundtree that she rather doubted whether 
•Sir Ralph was in his right senses. Lady Round- 
tree, vexed at Marion's rare obstinacy in refusing 
to see Sir Ralph, and not over-pleased by the fact 
that Walter was in London and in that neighbour- 
hood, would have concealed the intelligence for 
the present ; but Mrs. Pepys, at her husband's 
bidding, said a few words to Lucy while her lady- 
ship's back was turned, and Lucy ran up-stairs to 
her young mistress with the glad news. 

Sir Ralph had not been gone much more than 
an hour when Lady Roundtree, who, with Mrs. 
Pepys, was looking out of the window, shouted 
in a glad voice, "As I live, there is Sir John on 
the other side of the street, and hale and well ; 

thank God for that ! But who hath he 

under his arm ? " — " 5 T is Captain Wynton," said 
Pepys, who had approached the window ; " and 
only hear how the people are cheering him ! " In 
another minute Sir John and his new friend were 
up-stairs and in the room. The greetings between 
the old knight and his wife were tender enough, 
and the civilities of Pepys and his spouse all that 
they should be. " But," said the good knight, 
" where is Marion ? I trust in God not ill, or not 
. . . ." In the next instant his apprehensions 
were removed, for Marion, hearing the good news 
of his arrival, ran into the room and into his open 
arms, kissing his hand and next his cheek, down 
which some big tears were rolling. She did not 
recognise Captain Wynton — so long was it since 
she had seen him, and in that interval bad health 

M 



246 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

had greatly altered the veteran's looks ;— but judge 
her astonishment and joy when her guardian pre- 
sented to her his neighbour and now fast friend, 
Captain Wynton, the bravest and best man that 
ever wore a sword ! Then followed the marvel- 
lous, and, both to the Knight and the Captain, most 
welcome intelligence of the resurrection of Sir 
Ralph Spicer, and the re-appearance in London of 
master Walter, which was given in a very dramatic 
and striking manner by our ingenious friend Pepys, 
who praised and applauded Walter far more than 
the knight had done his father. 

" But where is the dear boy? Where is my 
long-lost only son ?" said the Captain. 

" I judge," said Pepys, " that he is not far off, 
and will soon be here, for he had the name of 
this house and knew who was in it ; and it was no 
farther off than in Tower Street, and barely two 
hours ago that I saw him, looking as well and as 
handsome as ever he did in his life, although he 
had a felt hat on his head and only a farmer's serge 
coat on his back. I opine that he hath gone to 
equip himself in a manner more suitable to his 
rank. I wish I had thought of sending him to 
mine own tailor, Mr. Pin ; but my heart was over- 
full with joy at seeing master Walter, and so I 
forgot it." 

" D— n coats and tailors !" said Sir John ; " I 
wish the boy would come as he was." 

Pepys, who could never hear a tailor mentioned, 
and much less d — d, without some emotion, stepped 
aside and began to assist Lady Eoundtree and his 
wife in mixing a welcome-cup for Sir John and 
Captain Wynton. It was nearly at the same nick 
of time that that comforting and comfortable 



DOMESTIC PEACE AFTER WAR. 247 

handmaiden Lucy came in and spoke with her 
young mistress, who thereupon went out to the 
corridor at the head of the staircase — to meet 
master Walter and to be recompensed in one bliss- 
ful minute for all the agonies and anxieties she had 
suffered for weeks. She then went to her own 
apartment to recover her composure, and Walter 
went into the drawing-room to enjoy happiness 
scarcely less exquisite than that which he had just 
tasted. Marion soon re-appeared, looking, as 
Walter thought, more beautiful than ever he had 
seen her. Pepys afterwards declared that this 
domestic drama beat the finest play he had ever 
beheld upon the stage : he regretted that he had not 
seen the first meeting of the young hero and he- 
roine on the staircase ; but he was so much affected 
by the meeting of Walter and his brave old father, 
that he shed more tears than he had shed at the 
last new tragedy. He was a man of the world, it 
is true, but Pepys was also a man of feeling. And 
when he saw the quiet modest raptures of the 
young couple, and the tender, frank, and manly 
bearing of Walter, he thought of the match he had 
made at Dagenham, of that very poor creature the 
rich Mr. Carteret, and of the tears and deep sad- 
ness of Lady Jemima Montague; and his heart 
smote him. Mrs. Pepys, seeing the momentary 
sadness of her husband, and reading his inward 
thoughts, said in his ear, " Samuel, have no more 
to do with match-making and grand marriages ! 
These things are best left to those that are most 
concerned in them. This manly young fellow re- 
minds me of you in your courting-days ; but I was 
neither so pretty nor so fond as mistress Marion — 
was I, Mr. Pepys ?" He squeezed her hand, and 

M 2 



248 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

said, " Thou wast quite as fond, my Bessy, and 
almost quite as pretty." And with these words his 
sadness passed away. 

It was a happy evening this in the Minories, and 
the forerunner of many happy days. 

When Sir Ralph Spieer repeated his visit, the 
door was closed to him by the express command of 
Sir John, who had worked himself up to this reso- 
lution by reflecting that as he was not in his own 
house, but only in an inn, there was no breach of 
hospitality; and that the visit could only cause 
vexation and confusion to Marion, Walter, and 
Captain Wynton, and to his cousin Sir Ralph him- 
self. Indeed, by this time Lady Roundtree had 
been completely talked out of her partiality for the 
courtier by Pepys and his wife, who gave (what they 
were well able to do) a terrible account of the ex- 
travagance, recklessness, profligacy, and debauch- 
ery of the present race of courtiers in general, and 
of Sir Ralph Spieer in particular, telling the 
Kentish gentlewoman tales which she had never 
heard a breath of, which she never could have con- 
ceived, and which made her shake almost as much 
as Pepys had done at Tom's whispering in his ear 
" The memory of the wicked shall perish." But 
the little blow which completed the alienation, and 
converted her ladyship into Sir Ralph's enemy for 
life, was adroitly put in by Mrs. Pepys in a tete-a- 
tete in her own drawing-room in Seething Lane. 
After complimenting her ladyship on the juvenility 
of her looks, and on the wonderful improvement 
made in her appearance by a new silk-dress, cut 
and made by Mrs. Pepys's own milliner, and by a 
black patch or two on the face, which her ladyship 
now wore for the first time, although the fashion 



DOMESTIC PEACE AFTER WAR. 249 

of patching had come in with the Restoration, the 
clever wife of the Clerk of the Acts, bursting as it 
were into an involuntary passion of indignation 
and astonishment, exclaimed — " Oh, the perfidy of 
that wicked Sir Ralph ! Oh, his malice and blind- 
ness too ! What does your sweet ladyship think 
he had the insolence, the virulence, to say to Pe- 
pys that day they were walking from the Devil 
tavern to the Minories ?" 

"Why! what?" said Lady Roundtree, much 
agitated ; " what could that graceless man say of a 
virtuous woman like me ?" 

" Oh !" said Mrs. Pepys, " he said . . . 
But I must not tell ; Pepys almost made me swear 
that I would not, and he will be so angry if I do." 

" But, my dear madam," said her ladyship, 
" Mr. Pepys need not know it — nay, I vow he 
shall not know it from me." 

" I can scarcely find words to say it — but Sir 
Ralph did say to Pepys that, finding that Marion 
would not listen to him, he, to amuse the dulness 
of Erith and to promote his scheme of getting 
Marion's person and fortune for some of his crew, 
did enter upon some amorous passages with your 
ladyship a la mode de France?' 

" But if he had that boldness," said her lady- 
ship, reddening a little, " he could never say that 
I was other than cruel to his suit. And " 

" Nay, madam, the lying fellow told Pepys that 
you were fathoms deep in love with him, and 
thought him as deeply enamoured with your lady- 
ship, and that — " here Mrs. Pepys paused and put 
on a look of vast mortification. 

" But what else did the fellow say ?" said her 
ladyship. 

m 3 



250 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY, 

" Why, my lady, he said that at your time of 
life, instead of thinking of gallantries and amour- 
ettes, you ought to be thinking of your prayers ; 
and that a pair of spectacles and a new folio Bible 
would have been a more suitable present for one of 
your years, than the monkey he took down to 
Erith at his last visit !" 

" The monster !" said Lady Roundtree. " May 
he be hanged as his monkey was ! My time of 
life, gadzooks ! My years ! Why, I am younger 
than he by " 

" Ten years at least, and twenty years in looks," 
said clever Mrs. Pepys, while her ladyship was 
hesitating in her arithmetic. " But do not let this 
horrible insolence chafe you ; he is a godless, beg- 
garly fellow, unworthy of your ladyship's notice, 
nay, even of your ladyship's contempt." 

" If he owes Sir John a farthing he owes him 
five hundred broad pieces! I would have Sir 
John arrest him for the debt, but I know he won't. 
I wish master Walter had finished him outright 
on Plumstead Common. But I will never see his 
drunken face again." 

" My lady," said Mrs. Pepys, pointing to a 
small mirror in the room, " look there at your 
own dear face, and feel how foully the rogue hath 
lied." 

The storm passed over without any injury to the 
Pepys's in her ladyship's favour — so adroitly had 
Mrs. Pepys managed the business ; but there was 
no hope or chance that Sir Ralph would ever regain 
the ground he had lost. 

After the gallant affair at the Hope, in which 
the Dutch lost a great deal of honour, de Ruyter 
and Van Ghent made no further attempt, either in 



DOMESTIC PEACE AFTER WAR, 251 

the Thames or in the Med way. They merely 
blockaded both rivers, and captured such home- 
ward-bound ships as came in their way. Their 
blockade, however, occasioned one serious incon- 
venience : the Newcastle colliers could no longer 
come up the river, and London was reduced to a 
sad extremity through want of coals. The King 
was obliged to send to Say's Court for the ingeni- 
ous Mr. Evelyn, and to employ that gentleman 
and other members of the Royal Society in seek- 
ing for other fuel, or for some substitute for coal, 
in the neighbourhood of London. A fanatic, 
whom our friend Pepys called and set down for a 
Quaker, typified at this time, in a very lively 
manner, the combustion that was in store for this 
wicked government, and for the sinful parts of the 
nation, unless they turned from the wickedness of 
their ways, and repented in sackcloth and ashes. 
This man came naked through Westminster Hall 
(only very civilly tied about the loins to avoid 
scandal), and, with a chafing-dish of fire and 
brimstone burning upon his head, did pass right 
through the Hall, crying " Repent ! repent !" 

Heartily sick of the town, and of almost every- 
thing they saw in it, our Kentish friends returned 
all together to Erith at the end of July. When we 
say all, we include poor Tom, the ex-Kentish 
prophet, who had rapidly recovered health and 
strength, and who had confirmed and strengthened 
his sanity by a few glimpses he took of men far 
madder than he had ever been, even when he lived 
in the woods, and wore the prophetical beard. 
Place a lunatic among men madder than himself, 
and he either gets as wild as they or recovers. It 
was running a risk, perhaps, but Tom, whose heart 



252 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

had still some cleavings to the religious sect to 
which he had for a length of time belonged, had 
ventured once or twice into Gravel Lane, and 
heard the preachings and saw the wrestlings of 
Hiram Bingley and his associate fanatics, who were 
fiercely contending with one another about judg- 
ments and prophecies, and railing against the Om- 
nipotent for delaying the establishment of their 
dominion over the earth. 

" I will go no more to these dens," said Tom, 
" for they are full of traitors and conspirators. 
These men are mad with many things — but most 
of all with vanity. Better any church, or any form 
of government, than such as these maniacs would 
establish !" 

Sir John, who had always been disposed to en- 
tertain a kindly feeling for the poor man, and to 
take the proper view of his case when he lived in 
the woods, now offered to make him his chief 
woodsman ; and Tom accepted the offer most 
gladly, for he loved his old haunts still ; and the 
post would keep him near to master Walter ; and 
he understood the woodsman's craft to perfection ; 
and he would not have relished the bread of idle- 
ness, old as he was. Will Gaff could hardly be 
left behind in the great city, or sent adrift, after 
all that he had done for Walter, and suffered with 
him. Will was not a Kentish man, nor, indeed, 
native to any county whatever, for he was born at 
sea in a gale of wind — latitude and longitude both 
uncertain, as were also sundry other circumstances 
connected with his birth. But Captain Wynton 
undertook to provide for him in his household at 
Charlton, and so Will went into Kent with the 
rest of our friends. 



DOMESTIC PEACE AFTER WAR. 253 

Mr. Pepys had not failed of speaking in high 
quarters about the services rendered by Walter 
and Tom ; and General Hilborough had borne his 
testimony with right good will, and without any 
regard to the envying and sneering courtiers, and 
favourite officers. The Duke of York promised to 
speak to the King, but forgot so to do for a long 
while ; and when the King was spoken to, he said 
that he would think about the matter, and see how 
some rewards or honours might be bestowed upon 
the brave volunteers. But the merry monarch 
never found time for any such thoughts ; and per- 
haps at this late date it might have been found 
very awkward and inconvenient to contradict the 
lying Court Gazette of the day, which had given 
great lauds and glorifications to his Grace of Albe- 
marle, General Middleton, Sir Edward Sprague, 
and other officers of high rank — who had all de- 
served to be brought to a court-martial — for beat- 
ing the Dutch in the Medway, and driving them 
out of that river. Sir John Roundtree was indig- 
nant at these palpable falsehoods, and at the ingra- 
titude of the court towards Captain Wynton and 
his son ; but, with the exception of Sir John, none 
of our Kentish friends cared much about it. Cap- 
tain "Wynton would have despised any honour that 
such a government could have given him ; Walter 
had no longer anything to fear ; and after Tom's 
change of life and opinions there was nothing to 
fear for him. Although Tom had renounced pro- 
phecy for ever, he could not patiently listen to 
those w r ho said he had been out in his last predic- 
tion, inasmuch as this visitation from the Dutch, 
instead of being a greater was a much less serious 
calamity than the Great Fire. " Friends and coun- 



254 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY* 

trymen," Tom would say with great solemnity, 
" the shame brought upon the navy and the flag of 
England is the greatest of national calamities, and 
if these disgraces are not retrieved we must cease 
to be a nation. A city consumed by fire may be 
builded up again with timber and bricks and mor- 
tar ; but honour and fame, once lost, are not so 
easily restored. This black spot upon our banner 
is indelible. Well for posterity if it serve them 
as a warning! 'Tis all up with old England 
when these events of the year sixteen hundred and 
sixty-seven shall be regarded as a light judgment, 
or when Englishmen shall hear the story without 
anger and shame.' , 

At the end of the month of July, the Pensioner 
de Witt having yielded to the will of the French 
King, the Dutch consented to give the King of 
England a peace, and the treaty of Breda was 
signed and duly ratified. It was a treaty disgrace- 
ful to England ; but, with such a mad government, 
it was far better for the country to accept it, than 
to continue the war. De Ruyter's great fleet, 
which had so long blockaded the Thames, and 
ridden triumphantly from the North Foreland to 
the Buoy of the Nore, fired a feu dejoie and went 
home. 

A few days after the disappearance of the last 
Dutch flag from our shore, Walter and Marion 
were married in the pretty little old church of 
Erith. It was a bright sunny day, and the whole 
village took part in the joy and festivity. Mike 
Woodenspoon, with official staff in hand, and with 
an enormous bouquet of flowers on one breast of 
his best coat, and a proportionately large favour of 
white silk ribbon on the other, marshalled the 



DOMESTIC PEACE AFTER WAR. 255 

villagers, and headed the procession which fol- 
lowed the bride and bridegroom and their near 
friends ; and he then kept guard in the church 
porch, with great dignity, while the service was 
being performed within. Even Lady Roundtree, 
who had so long made the current of this true 
love run unsmooth, was contented and jubilant. 
Everybody was happy at Erith on this sunny day, 
for all loved Marion and master Walter, and 
the overflowing hospitality of Sir John Roundtree 
did not leave time for one sad or serious thought. 
The feast, to which all were bidden, began at noon 
with a substantial dinner in the old Elizabethan 
style, and with a profusion of wine, and supplies of 
ale of such a quality as excited the astonishment 
even of Mike Woodenspoon, who " kenned " all 
the ale that was brewed in the parish. After din- 
ner there were sports and pastimes out of doors, 
and music and dancing upon the lawn. The bride 
and bridegroom danced among the servants and 
tenantry. Nay, even Captain Wynton felt so light- 
hearted on this occasion that he led out my Lady 
Round tree, and danced a coranto with her. As 
for Sir John, the dear hilarious old man, he danced 
with gentle and simple, and with nearly every maid 
and matron present, for he had drunk rather more 
claret than was his wont, and felt so young and 
happy that he could not sit still, although his 
amazed wife repeatedly warned him that gout or 
rheumatism might follow such frolics. But the 
most active performer of all was "Will Gaff, who, 
although he occasionally missed stays, being rather 
top-heavy with the knight's strong ale, whisked, 
whirled, jumped, and capered from the time they 
came out from dinner until the time they were 



256 THE DUTCH IN THE MEDWAY. 

called back to supper. Matrons and maids al 
declared that Will was a very proper man and i 
right merry one; but one maiden there was tha 
was so charmed with our honest sailor, and h< 
with her, that within three weeks she became Mrs 
Gaff. 

The bride did little more than appear at tin 
supper-table, to kiss the wassail-cup, and to acknow 
ledge, by one sweet thankful smile, the toast tha 
was rapturously drunk to her happiness in th< 
wedded life. 

Walter and Marion continued to live entirely ii 
the country, dividing their time between the plea 
sant house at Erith and Captain Wynton's hom< 
at Charlton. Except to gratify my Lady Round 
tree, or to make purchases of books and othe? 
things not easily obtained out of London, the} 
hardly ever approached the great city, where, ir. 
truth, for many years there continued to be verj 
little to attract people of honourable and refinec 
feelings, but very much to repel them. It was ar 
unprincipled and disgraceful era, the degradatioi. 
of England being completed a few years after b\ 
Charles II. becoming the pensioner of the Frencl 
King. Still there was private happiness wherevei 
there was household virtue. The happiness of oui 
young friends, and of those around them, was com 
plete. 



uy 



IN i^ 



iB4D 



THE END. 



London.: Printed by William Clowes and Sons, Stamford Street. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



DDD24bEmflO 



